Sage of War
by ScarletAesir058
Summary: The 4th Shinobi World War lasted 6 months and ended the day Naruto killed Kaguya. With her dying breath Kaguya hurled Naruto through a portal and into the unknown. So when Naruto wakes up on a strange new world full of gods, aliens, metahumans and magic, he has to figure out his place in the world. Preferably after dealing with this sudden invasion of Apokoliptan monsters. AU
1. Chapter 1: The Godslaying Ninja!

Pairing: Naruto/Supergirl/Wonder-Woman/Grail/Mera/Shay Veritas/Zatanna/Poison Ivy/Donna Troy?

Rating: M

Summary: The 4th Shinobi World War lasted 6 months longer than projected and ended the day Naruto killed Kaguya. With her dying breath Kaguya hurled Naruto through a portal and into the unknown. So when Naruto wakes up on a strange new world full of gods, aliens, metahumans and magic, he has to figure out his place in the world. Preferably after dealing with the sudden invasion of monsters from some place called Apokolips. Naru/Harem. Strong/Smart Naruto. AU

Disclaimer: I do not own the Naruto franchise or DC comics. I do this for fun and to improve myself as writer.

**A/N:** So welcome to my new story, Sage of War. I figured I should do something for DC as well since I already have a Naruto/Marvel fic and i've been thinking of doing second on as well. Also I wanted to do a story with much shorter chapters so I can get into the habit of updating more frequently(I really hope that works out). For those of you waiting for the next chapter of 'An Unorthodox Hero', it will be uploaded by tomorrow along with a bit of an explanation on why it was so late.

This story focuses on a godslayer Naruto, with the act of slaying a god having more unique consequences and being more meaningful than in AUH. Naruto's journey begins with Darkseid's Invasion in the New 52 Justice League run and will follow a lot of the stories from the New 52 comics. However there is also a ton of shit about the New 52 stuff that I just utterly hated, so there will also be a lot of changes.

That said, everything revolving around Wonder Woman will be from the New 52 to run of her comic. All of it will be canon in this fic, rather than the Rebirth stuff, though I will draw inspiration from there. Like make the gods look less like freaks, and keep Themyscira hidden, but also still accessible to Diana. I will also be bringing in Supergirl into the story far earlier rather than after the 5 year time skip from Darkseid's invasion when all the other stories really begin to pick up. I am basically throwing out most of the stuff from the supergirl comics, holy shit they fucked up that comic hard.

Okay so I am little sore about that, she's always been a favorite character of mine. In short there will be changes here and there, and somethings will simply play out differently cause of Naruto's presence and unique power set. Naruto will also be based in National city when he isn't doing Justice League stuff.

You can also see the pairing above, its already big and not changing so please don't ask me add more women, heck I am contemplating whether or not to add Donna Troy as it is? And yes, Naruto will be with Mera, Aquaman will find someone else to be his Aquawoman or just woman. The reasons why will probably show up next chapter. But enough of this, lets get on to story. I hope you enjoy it and please leave a review at the end.

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Chapter 1: The Godslaying Ninja!

"_Madara! You intend to cast the Infinite Tsukuyomi in front of us, such a pointless decision. Even if you could succeed at it before Naruto and I attacked you, what's to stop a fellow Rinnegan user such as myself from simply undoing the jutsu? You are the one who said that you have both our powers. Put another way, the two of us have the same abilities as you. So go ahead and wast your chakra trying, we will stop you over and over again."_

— S**asuke Uchiha to Madara Uchiha**

**oOo**

Darkness!

It was present as an almost tangible feeling here, thick and completely suffusing the evening air, to the point of sending every single one of Naruto's empathic senses haywire. Something was coming, something well and truly evil, and for the first time since he had killed Kaguya in one on one combat, Naruto felt truly afraid.

Yet even now, despite what his instincts were telling him, Naruto knew that he could not run away. Not from this, not from humanity in its time of need.

It was a different reality, with a different humanity than the one he had all but given his life to protect, yet some things would always remain the same. Naruto Uzumaki had always been someone who would lend a hand to anyone who looked like they simply needed a little help. He wasn't one to go out of his way to save people just because he had powers, he was too new to this world to ever contemplate that. However, he was still willing to help anyone he came across that needed it, and would not ignore any injustices that caught his attention.

He bore no illusions about being some grand defender of the innocent, champion of justice or guardian of truth. No, he was a very down to Earth person and simply aided others out of the kindness of his heart because they genuinely needed it, nothing more. There was no need for a grand design or some great drive to motivate him to help people, he just did so cause he was a kind person. And, right now Naruto felt in his very bones that the Earth really needed his help.

Naruto had barely been on this culturally diverse world three weeks, and spent most of that time discovering everything he needed to learn to blend in. Thankfully, he had assistance in the form of a few thousand clones scattered across the globe and a witch capable of peering into the future, to give him some much needed direction. Between his favorite ninjutsu technique and Madame Xanadu's help, he sufficiently closed the gaping hole in his knowledge base, to a point that he could pass himself off as a local. His research mostly focusing on general things about the world, with the only exception being the world's self ordained protectors. Naruto was keenly interested in them and their abilities.

Vigilantes in colorful costumes were popping up everywhere in America, and cause of that the rest of the world was paying close attention to the US. Batman, Superman, Flash, Wonder Woman, Green Lantern and Aquaman were all heavily featured in US newspaper articles as the most famous of these vigilantes. It was mostly due to the authorities wanting to either reign them and their activities in or bring them to justice for some various reason. However, as far as Naruto could tell, these vigilantes were doing a better job at ridding their cities of crime than the authorities themselves.

He recognized these selfless individuals for what they were, heroes trying to do whatever they could to help their cities regardless of anyone's opinions. However even Naruto had to admit that they were a flashy bunch in their eye catching costumes. In the end, while he wouldn't be caught dead wearing tights or spandex, Naruto respected them for what they were doing to protect the innocent. It was very noble and their approach to it was fascinating.

If he ever stopped in one city long enough to become attached to it, he would probably would try it out. For now, though he had other things to worry about. Mainly the calamity that was soon to befall the Earth.

From his perspective almost no time had passed since the end of the war. He had been 17 and half back then, and fighting Kaguya all alone due to Sasuke being injured earlier. It was easily the toughest battle of his life, lasting several weeks of non-stop fighting. In the end he emerged from it victorious, with Kaguya on the ground, mortally wounded from their fierce battle.

Truthfully, Naruto had merely survived the fight to the death with the goddess. Kaguya had beaten him to within an inch of his life and broke nearly every bone in his body over the course of the battle. It was only Kurama using all of its remaining chakra to heal him and Naruto's skill in Senjutsu that allowed him to out last her after Sasuke somehow cut Kaguya off from accessing more chakra through her prisoners stuck in the **Infinite Tsukuyomi**. By the end Naruto had been little more than a giant human shaped bruise, extremely low on chakra and merely the victor cause unlike Kaguya, he wasn't quite dying from his injuries.

Unfortunately even in defeat the Legendary Rabbit Goddess was a sore loser and had one last trick up her sleeve for him before she died. Naruto remembered as she lay at his feet dying, how she laughed a bitter remorseful laugh before saying. **"If i won't ever see my garden again, then neither will you. Perish, Naruto Uzumaki."**

The sudden build up of what was left of her monstrously powerful chakra, was all Naruto was able to sense before the world turned pure white around him and he resigned himself to an end. He had very little memory of what happened afterwards, but he expected to die after the technique activated. He did not though.

Instead of death, Naruto ended up flung somewhere else, somewhere beyond both the Elemental Nations and Earth, somewhere extremely dangerous. His memories of that in between place were faded, but he still remembered how it felt, and that someone had found him there and began talking to him. What was said was beyond him but he came out of that in-between place, forever changed because of it. It was from their that he was sent to the planet Earth.

3 weeks ago Naruto woke up in a random alley in Gotham City, physically five years older than he last remembered. His body was now that of someone in their early twenties, despite having no memories of ever aging. He also now stood at 6'3"ft as opposed to the 5'5"ft he once was, and at 174lbs, weighed an additional 62lbs than he remembered.

Every fiber of every muscle in his body was perfectly toned from a lifetime of combat and training, he lacked the bulkiness of Superman or even Batman and was closer in form to the Flash due to his preference of speed over power, though slightly bigger than the speedster. Even his hair that had always been a perfect spiky golden blond, now had a large splotch of white just above his forehead bangs. A remnant from his Otsutsuki heritage.

His increased height and weight had necessitated new clothes, cause his old one's were shredded. Lucky for him, Madame Xanadu Xanadu foresaw his arrival on Earth, and was waiting with a cab and a fresh change of clothes at the mouth of the alley he appeared in. She had foreseen not only his arrival with her precognition, but all the good he would do for the world, and she decided to help provide him with clothing, food, shelter and information while he got his feet under him. Naruto owed the immortal witch a great debt of gratitude for everything she had been doing for him over the weeks. A debt he was determined to repay someday.

Naruto currently wore black military cargo pants, with combat boots and a black T-shirt with an orange flame pattern adorning its edges. All in all he looked pretty normal aside from his three whisker-like birthmarks on each cheek, which people passed off as a some kind of genetic anomaly when they noticed them. However, Naruto was anything but normal now.

Even beyond what was normally considered his peak ability, Naruto's pure strength, speed, durability and regenerative powers had all steeply increased since awakening on Earth. Every single one of his senses had also been heightened to new levels, so much so that even in his base form he felt like he was constantly in Sage mode. The sudden changes had necessitated finding an abandoned warehouse and spending 3 days mastering his heightened senses. He had then entered sage mode to confirm for himself that he could still do it and that it was not somehow active.

He almost had a heart attack when he found that his Sage mode was not active. When he finally activated Sage mode, Naruto discovered he was vastly more powerful, to the point that it actually terrified him. He felt like he could juggle mountains with ease and punt Madara halfway across the planet if the Uchiha fought him, the way he was now.

There was just something ridiculously powerful about the Nature energy of this world, or was it Nature energies. As far as Naruto could tell, Sage mode wasn't pulling in just one type of energy whenever he gathered nature energy for Sage mode but several different powerful energy's. Luckily he was a pro at balancing different kinds of powerful energies and using them to empower himself. He hadn't tried them out yet, but Naruto suspected that Kurama chakra mode, Kurama-Sage Mode and Six Paths Sage mode would only further heighten his abilities beyond normal, despite his already ridiculous power upgrade.

In the end, Naruto wasn't sure whether the power boost to his base form, had come from growing five years older before he woke up, killing Kaguya or the sheer potency of the natural energies of this world. He personally leaning towards having grown more powerful as he aged, but he could be wrong. Even so, Naruto believed it was fortunate that he grown so much stronger due to the threats this world faced.

For while he was new to this world, enough had been covered in different news articles to point out that the dangers it regularly faced were vastly greater than anything he had encountered in the Elemental Nations. Even Superman who was far more physically powerful than him had enemies that could match his seemingly limitless strength and possibly exceed it. That thought actually terrified Naruto, he was very confident in his fighting skills and chakra abilities, but there was a reason Superman was called "Superman", and Naruto did not want to tango with any of the Man of Steel's sparring partners if he could help it.

Speaking of Superman, it was about time the two met for a chat according to Xanadu. Naruto would've preferred to reveal himself to the world and its protectors at a much later time, but some things it seemed, couldn't be helped. Particularly when, today was a day the world would potentially end if key heroes did not gather besides Superman. It helped that he had a mysterious box he had confiscated from a monster that had defeated in National City yesterday, after Madame Xanadu's directed him there.

With all the information he had been gathering about Earth since his arrival, Naruto easily noted that the markings on the cube were not of Earth. He had pressed Madame Xanadu for answers on this mystery and she had merely told him they were most likely alien in origin. So what better idea was there than to ask the only confirmed alien he knew about, for answers. Superman loved to help people right, so this would probably be right up the guy's alley.

Rising to his feet his icy sapphire eyes took in the faint glow of the dusk on the skyline, and then he turned west as he began to ascended into the air. It had been a pain in the ass to get the 3rd Tsuchikage Ohnoki, to teach him the secret to flight, mostly because Naruto was the son of Iwa's greatest enemy, but everyone had had to make great sacrifices in the war for the sake of peace. Turning towards the direction he knew Metropolis was located in, Naruto shot off at well past Mach 6, creating a loud sonic boom in his wake.

VvV

"Aww man and we were just getting to the good part!" Naruto whined childishly as he looked down at the group of four Vigilantes from on top of a street lamppost he'd been crouching on. His words were more than sufficient to startle everyone present, who were all surprised to find him silently watching them from his perch. Superman was especially shocked due his super-hearing failing to pick up Naruto's heartbeat or something.

The sun had gone down and it was much later in the evening when Naruto stumbled across this admittedly interesting sight. He had been searching the Metropolis skyline for Superman, when he picked up loud explosion green flashes of light with his enhanced hearing. It made it easy for him to hunt down the benevolent alien, who would no doubt be at the epicenter of it all. What he hadn't expected was to find Superman trying his best to pummel the vigilante's Batman and Green Lantern to do death. Weren't they all supposed to be good guys?

Naruto was about to intervene and hopefully save the two, when it became unnecessary due to a new arrival. One second Superman was beating the absolute tar out of a green spherical barrier Green Lantern had erected, and the next something hit him. Naruto called it something, because whatever it was, it was fast and left streaks of yellow lightning wherever it went.

However Naruto knew that it couldn't have been lightning, cause Naruto himself was faster than lightning, and yet he couldn't even keep up with this **thing** due to its frankly frightening speed. Admittedly he was still in his base form and entering Sage mode or Kurama mode would definitely allow him to at least visually keep track of it properly. However that would've also give away his position and Naruto felt his intuition telling him that he could learn a lot more by simply observing for a moment from the sidelines.

It was only after the thing finally stopped that Naruto realized it was in fact a man in a red outfit, and not just any man, but the Central City vigilante, the Flash. For a few milli-seconds he ran circles around superman who tried to physically catch the Flash with his own impressive speed, but the flash was simply **far** too fast.

That said, the lightning encased speedster was also too over confident in his speed and got too close to Superman, who surprised him by flicking him on the forehead and sending the speedster flying 30 meters away, into a car. Noting the casual and unnecessary destruction of property, Naruto felt he understood why Vigilante's were really unpopular with the U.S government. Finally Batman decided that enough was enough, and courageously step between Superman and others. With a single sentence he stopped Superman from punting them all halfway across Metropolis.

That was no surprise to Naruto, he knew the power of a few honest words and the affect they could have on people. Honest words had changed Haku, Zabuza, Gaara, Obito and he'd like to think Sasuke too but that might have just been the war. They had all been changed by his words, from evil people into good and they were simply the most extreme examples. How many more people had come to believe in him simply due to a few words.

What was a surprise however was the familiar alien box that Batman carried under his arm. Naruto speculated that Batman must have come here to see Superman for similar reasons as himself, due to the box's unearthly nature. And with that knowledge Naruto decided to reveal himself to them.

"Who are you supposed to be?" Flash asked as surprised as everyone else that they hadn't notice Naruto crouching there. But then again with Superman on a rampage, who would have paid attention to the top of a single isolated streetlamp. Its not like it was a normal place for people to crouch.

Waving the alien box for all of them to see, Naruto responded. "Just another guy who was curious about these alien looking boxes and the creatures carrying them." Tossing his own box down at Flash who caught he, he continued. "I thought I might ask big blue and red over there if he knew what they were. But when I got here you were all pretty busy fighting each other, so I figured I would just watch and see how it ended. I am glad I did too, you heroes all have pretty interesting abilities."

"You're not a hero?" Superman asked, picking up on his choice of words.

"If by hero you mean a vigilante running around a city in tights, trying to make it better, then no, I am not that." Naruto replied somewhat sarcastically, but his tone was lighthearted. Sure he respected them and what they did, but seriously tights. "I am a warrior more than anything else, but one who's never been able to turn his back on humanity when it needed help, kind of like it does now. Anyways now that you are no longer fighting and Superman clearly knows nothing about these boxes, as do the rest of you. I think I will tag along with you guys, at least until you find something. From what little I observed, Batman seems pretty smart and skilled at figuring things out, I am sure we can all come up with something together."

"Wow their kid. This job is dangerous and we can't just have a rookie running around. You don't even have a suit or mask to hide your identity. We can't just let another civilian-" Green Lantern began only to be cut off as hand placed itself on his shoulder.

Startled Green Lantern spun around to find a second Naruto standing right next to him who asked. "You're Green Lantern right? The same guy the Airforce is after right?"

Shrugging the hand of his shoulder as he stepped back from Naruto to give himself some, he replied. "Ah yeah! And how the hell are their two of you? Are you twins or something?"

"That one is my clone, a temporary copy of myself for you to attack in the event you turned out to be hostile after I revealed myself. I believe that's unnecessary now." Naruto said, as the clone on the lamppost disappeared in cloud of smoke, leaving only the one near Green Lantern. "Also, I am not a civilian, I am a ninja and trust me when I say we are not like your pop culture likes to depict. I have all kinds abilities that you couldn't even dream up on your best day, so quit it with the rookie shit. I've been saving lives since I was 12."

With that Naruto smirked as he held up Green Lanterns power ring to show off to the space cop, whose Green Lantern uniform was beginning to disappear. Looking to his finger where he realized that indeed his power ring was missing, Green Lantern glared at Naruto who was toying with the ring and yelled. "When did he-?"

In unison Batman and Naruto replied. "You weren't concentrating."

"That's mine." Green Lantern yelled before calling the ring back to his finger through his connection to it. He then turned to Batman and said. "And this time doesn't count, is he your son or something Spooky?"

"No!" Was Batman's one word reply.

Naruto watched the two, finding some amusement in Green Lantern nickname for Batman, there was a whole story there that he didn't quite understand yet. Turning to Superman Naruto said. "Now that we've established I can take care of myself, can we get going before those helicopters show up."

"You have super-hearing too?" Superman asked surprised at the revelation from the young man who had joined their ranks. Naruto nodded in response, to which Superman then explained. "That would be the army, which means Lex Luthor isn't far behind."

"Not a fan of Lex Luthor I take it?" Batman asked, his own disdain for the billionaire audible in his tone despite the fact that his mask and dark body armor kept his face and body language mostly hidden.

"No!" Superman replied before turning to Naruto and asking. "So what do we call you?"

"My name is Naruto Uzumaki, a remnant of the Uzumaki clan of shinobi's. You can all call me Sage though, for now at least, or Naruto. I'll be honest, I don't particularly care about hiding my identity, and I have ways to disguise my appearance if it ever became a problem." The shinobi explained

"Sage it is then. Seeing as you are already here, you are welcome to tag along." Batman said, welcoming him to the group, no doubt to keep a closer eye on him and get whatever information he could out of him. Naruto almost felt like he was back home and was beginning to like the darkly clad vigilante for it.

"Get clear guys. I will clean up." Flash suddenly volunteered as he motion to the mess that was formerly their battle ground. Blurring away at speeds that would've made lightning envious, the red clad speedster rapidly begin to repair all the damage from the fight earlier. Naruto had to admire the guy and his attitude if he was willing to clean up after his messes.

Figuring he shouldn't leave all the work to Flash, Naruto joined him with his own super-speed, helping Flash fix what ever they could. After all, _'when in Rome, do as the Romans do',_ and all that jazz.

In mere minutes, all the damages from the fight that had spanned the entire downtown area where quickly repaired and Metropolis was looking good again. Then a small fleet of army helicopters showed up and the five heroes decided to escape through a sewer much to Green Lantern's Chagrin. With a smile on his face, Naruto thought to himself. _'This might actually turn out to be fun!'_

VvV

The ninja and his four vigilante companions found themselves in an old abandoned factory belonging to the Daily Planet. It was an abandoned printing press and apparently acted as Superman's base of operations, until he could find a proper one. Batman seemed less than impressed with it, and voiced his opinion. "An abandoned printing press? Don't you have place to go hang your cape at the end of the day? You don't wear a mask so you don't have an identity to hide."

"I don't have a base of operations?" Superman defended.

"And you Sage?" Batman asked Naruto who was quietly listening to both Superman and Batman's conversation, as well as Flash and Green Lantern's further off.

"I was trained to blend into the shadows and one of my powers allows me to disguise myself as other people or things. I don't really need anything elaborate right now." Naruto spoke up, giving a little worthless information to get them to relax a little more around him. Batman tensed momentarily upon hearing this revelation but did indeed relax a second later.

Curious about his abilities Flash shifted his attention to them and asked. "What other powers do you have? You said earlier that you could disguise yourself, and we've already seen you use super-speed, as well as make copies of yourself."

"I can manipulate the elements, I'm stronger than everyone here except Superman and pretty durable. I can fly too, but I am not very good at it yet. There's is also more but I'll keep that to myself for now." Naruto replied. Truthfully, he had thousands of different techniques, but it was best to give out information on only a handful and have them think he was more...limited.

"You don't trust us." Superman accused. The Kryptonian must have picked up something in his tone, he did have better senses than Naruto after all.

Naruto merely shrugged, figuring it would be a waste of time to try and pretend, then replied. "Not one of us completely trusts the other, except for Flash and Green Lantern who are apparently friends. I only revealed as much I did so we have a basic understanding of what I can bring to the table. And to gain enough trust for you guys to work comfortably with me, but I'm not just going spill all my secrets to people who were complete strangers to me less than an hour. Those secrets you will have to earn."

"Reasonable." Batman said before he and Superman continued their private conversation. Flash, Green Lantern and Naruto meanwhile moved closer to the two alien boxes to examine them.

**Ping!**

"This can't be good." Naruto muttered as he took a closer look at the two alien boxes hovering in mid air where they were suspended by a field of emerald energy coming from Green Lantern's ring. He had just noticed that they both made that ping sound at the same time as if they were both receiving information from the same place. That or talking to each other, neither possibility was very welcome. "We should probably split these boxes up."

"Agreed. Those ping sounds they keep making might be messages they are transmitting to one another, or to another party. The creature that was carrying my box blew up trying to take us with it. That's military tactics and they act like expendable soldiers dedicated to finishing the mission at any cost. They've also been planting these boxes at strategic location...Metropolis, Gotham and you said yours came from National city right? I'm worried we might be staring down the barrel of a full-scale invasion here." Batman explained, filling the room with an uneasy air as everyone silently contemplated his words.

"That's paranoid." Green Lantern said, breaking the silence. A full scale planetary invasion wasn't something anyone wanted to really consider, so it was naturally easier to just dismiss it as paranoia or superstition. The truth was a hard pill to swallow after all.

"A little paranoia isn't bad in this job Green Lantern. A friend of mine warned me that today would be a dark day. She was the one who sent me to confront the creature in National city where I found my box. I would rather be ready if a war is coming." Naruto said.

"National City is your stomping grounds?" Batman asked.

"No, I was just passing through. I'm more of a wandering sage, seeing the world, helping wherever I can. Or at least I was trying to be before this mess started up." Naruto replied.

**Ping!**

"There it goes again with that creepy sound. Why not just crack one of these boxes open and see for ourselves what's inside? We have a spare." Green Lantern suggested as he motioned towards the boxes.

Frowning Batman replied. "Because without any idea of what these boxes contain, who knows what might come spilling out, radiation, disease or something worse."

"I can run one to a lab and do a full spectrum analysis on it, in case of fingerprints, DNA or anything else that might give us a lead as to what these things are and where they may have been." Flash offered.

Turning to him Batman said. "You sound like a cop."

"I am a cop, I work in a Crime Lab." Flash confirmed.

Elbowing the speedster in the ribs, Green Lantern not so subtly said. "Barry, you're giving away your secret identity."

"And you just called me Barry genius." Flash said with a glare at Green Lantern for revealing his name. Those two had a strange friendship in Naruto's opinion.

"I can't see anything when I try to look through the box's casing." Superman said floating closer to the box, his eyes glowing fain pale blue.

Bewildered, Flash asked. "You can see through the casing?"

"I can see through most things." Superman casually confirmed.

Everyone suddenly turned to look at Naruto to see if he had anything to add, since he had been silent for a bit. Shaking his head Naruto replied. "I am not like him. I do have pretty good eyesight and reaction time though."

Everyone then turned to Batman as Green Lantern asked mockingly. "What about you, what can you do?"

"I can keep us focused." Batman firmly responded.

**Ping!**

"Gaaaahh!" A short but pain filled scream tore itself from Naruto's throat as his right hand began to glow and the Yang seal that Hagoromo had once gave him began to glow a brilliant white in the center of his palm. Around the white circle, nine black tomoe formed, making it look like a pictogram of the sun. Going up the length of his right arm, red flame-like tribal markings appeared and finally connected to a diamond shaped mark surrounding by two wing patterns, right between his shoulder blades. It was a mark he had received on the day he killed Kaguya.

"Sage, the hell's going on with you? Your arm is glowing like a damn flashlight." Batman barked at him, as the pain began to recede. It had felt like he was being branded, like his skin had been flayed roar and every nerve ending exposed before being dipped acid. But he had also learned something while the process was going on.

"My Apologies Batman. My powers seem to be reacting negatively to the boxes. Its like they are trying to protect me from those boxes." Naruto explained after taking deep breaths. What had just happened was something new and strange, and it worried him immensely. Especially since both the Yang seal and the marking he'd received from killing Kaguya had activated simultaneously. _'Why had they activated? Was it because whatever was coming was nearly here?'_

These questioned would remain unanswered for his attention shifted to Green Lantern, who moved closer as if to touch the boxes but-.

**Ping!...Ping!...Ping!...Ping!...Ping!..Ping!.Ping!Ping!Ping!PING!PING!**

"What the! I didn't touch anything." The emerald theme hero yelped as he jumped backwards. The boxes both began pinging at faster and faster intervals as if it was a countdown. Naruto could feel his power begin to rage in response, as if trying to empower him further, even in his base state. It was almost time

"They're activated themselves." Superman yelled as the volume and frequency of the pings increased.

Moving in to action Batman pointed at the boxes and yelled. "Green Lantern isolate those boxes, we don't know what they might end up releasing when fully active."

Green Lantern responded by doing as batman ordered, a shell of emerald energy encased each in a large, spherical forcefield. He then moved them to the other side of the room in case the boxes exploded or something. They didn't, at least not in the way anyone would have expected.

**BOOOOOMMM!**

Green Lantern was barely done tossing the two boxes away when they were all hit with the wall of sound. Two large portals had suddenly bloomed into existence, one originating from each box. Big enough and forceful enough that they shattered Green Lantern's forcefields just by opening. Out of the portals emerged the very same type of monsters as the one Naruto had initially defeated to recover his box. Only this time, it wasn't just one or two of the monsters, but hundreds, and all of them were headed straight their way. _'Looks like Batman's invasion theory was right.'_

The monsters were the stuff of nightmares, standing at about seven and half feet tall, with arms bigger and bulkier than Superman's thighs. They were Humanoid in form, 20 razor sharp claws on each hand and foot replacing the digits traditionally located there, clearly designed for tearing through flesh and bone. Their skin was putrid green and had a leather-like consistency to it, their eyes covered by red goggle-like visors, glowed liked hellish embers.

They had a mouth filled with rows upon rows of razor sharp teeth, beyond which lay a maw that burned a molten orange, and from which the monsters could spew fire, like some kinds of humanoid dragon. From their backs they could sprout bat-like wings for flight, while their flesh was mostly protected by a strange bronze colored metal that was fused to their skin in a way that was most certainly painful. He would have pitied them, yet instinctively knew that pity was something wasted on the creatures. They were an enemy that needed to be killed, and quickly.

They hadn't even existed the portal, yet these creatures set off every single one of Naruto's instincts. His empathic abilities easily picking up what to him felt like pure evil. A mindless, all consuming evil that simply radiated from the monsters, and would soon begin corrupting the world around them. It was as if they were so heavily steeped in evil that it formed an aura around them that was almost tangible. The shinobi godslayer utterly hated it.

Growling at the creatures, the Sun symbol pattern in the palm of his hand flared even brighter in response to the invaders. Golden chakra slowly began to coat his right forearm, giving it an ethereal glow. Meanwhile Naruto's eyes shifted shifted from sapphire blue crystals to a flame-like yellow-orange, his pupils shifting into toad-like horizontal bars. It was a visual indicator that he had entered **Sage Mode**,and an unspoken promise of the world of hurt, the invading fiends were about to find themselves in.

Just as the first monster crossed the event horizon of the portal with a horrendous cry of, "**For Darkseid!**", Naruto **m**oved. He moved so fast that the concrete beneath his feet shattered in series of spiderweb cracks spanning over 10 meters. The air in front of him formed a cone around around him and blossomed outwards in a shockwave, displaced by his mere passing. Behind him, air rushed back into the vacuum he had created, bringing with it a thunderous sonic boom that shattered every window in the abandoned building. And then he was in front of the enemy.

The demonic looking creature did not have time to react before his fist connected with its solar plexus. It didn't even have time to realize it was dead before it flew backwards in a shockwave of energy, its whole body incinerating from the sheer force of the punch. The incinerated creature and blast of superheated air carrying its remains, slammed straight into its invading companions behind where it previously stood and bowled over the rest of the creatures, and throwing them right back into the portal.

One of the demons that had manage to dodge around Naruto's attack, tried to fly past him. However his hand reached out and grabbed it by the face before slamming it into the ground so forcefully, it created a small earth-tremor. With a mighty stop on its chest to keep it from moving, Naruto glared at the invaders and flared his killing intent at them.

For a moment the invasion, at least the part coming through these two portals ground to a complete and utter halt, as every one stared at Naruto in shock, heroes and demons alike. Naruto took note of none of this, glaring murderously straight at the demons, he barked an order in a tone so dead that it would have stopped even a rampaging Tailed Beast in its tracks. "Retreat or die!"

It was just for a few seconds, 4.3 seconds to be exact, yet in that moment every single one the creatures feared him. Survival instincts that had supposedly been bred out suddenly kicking in making them all take a step back. Unfortunately it only worked for a moment and a second later they all simultaneously retorted. "**For Darkseid**!"

Feeling he needed to answer this challenge, Naruto said the first thing that came to mind, but rather than shout it, he simply whispered back. "For the Will of Fire!" Then he **moved** again.

VvV

Naruto scowled as he ducked under the claws of one of the monsters before shoulder checking it aside with enough force that it cleared a path through its companions that had moved to surround him. Not a second later, he used the hole to escape while leaving an explosive tag behind, that was already activated.

The detonation caught ten of the monsters in a ball of flame, light and pressure but there were thousands more invading Earth through more portals each second. A well timed roundhouse kick connected with the head of a monster that thought him distracted enough to sneak up upon, said head was torn from the monsters shoulders. Naruto then spun low and then extended his foot into a sweeping kick to drop a follow up monster, before lifting his foot and bringing it down in a heel drop kick on the fallen monsters armored chest, crushing it.

Sidestepping a blast orange flames spewing from another of the monsters. Naruto lodged a kunai down its throat for its troubles, before crossing his fingers in the Clone Seal and muttering. "**Mass Shadow Clone Technique.**" A moment later 1000 clones surrounded him and he ordered. "Spread out across the city, secure the civilians, report in any Intel you might consider valuable and kill any monsters in your way. When your done await further instructions."

"**Yes Sir!"** A thousand voices replied in unison,before dispersing in a thousand different directions fast enough to create a buffeting wind.

With his clones on the counterattack, the original Naruto and his vigilante comrades had a bit of breathing room. They had been on the brink of being overrun by the sheer number of monsters invading Metropolis, especially after they all started converging on the groups location due to the fierce resistance the vigilantes were putting up. Thankfully that all changed the moment Naruto created his clones.

A thousand copies of Naruto with similar strength, speed and skill, all very well coordinated and tearing into the monsters while saving civilians. In the blink of an eye the whole battlefield situation seemed to reverse itself as, pairs of Naruto clones rapidly tag teamed the uncoordinated monsters and ripped them to shreds. Sometimes quite literally, as one clone would grab one limb and while the second would grab another, and then they would simply pull in different directions.

His clones new not use any chakra intensive techniques like Rasengan, so that they would last longer. In fact they were determined to conserve as much of their chakra as possible. This was a war, not a skirmish. It likely wouldn't end in a day, barring some kind of miracle, so he needed to use his power as efficiently as possible.

Dropkicking one of the monsters than had tried to attack Batman from his blindspot, he asked. "Now, what. These things are just gonna keep coming, and this clearly isn't an isolated incident."

A bolt of yellow lightning blurred past as Flash literally slapped half a dozen of the monsters nearby, the sheer speed and impact behind it actually cooking the monsters in their armor. He came a stop near Batman and Sage, where he said. "Sage is right guys. I'm getting radio broadcasts through my earpiece, this invasion is happening all around the world. People are blaming us for it."

A massive green fly swatter smacked dozens of the monsters out of the sky after they took to the air or squashed them on the ground if they didn't. Green Lantern who while exhausted looked like he was having fun said. "What else is new Flash."

"Lantern concentrate! Your mind is scattered, your constructs are fading. You need calm dow-" Batman yelled, noting that whenever Green Lantern stopped focusing on his constructs, they began disappearing. A very bad thing when his forcefields where also being used to create a safe haven for civilians caught in the crossfire.

"I am calm, I'm always calm." Green Lanter argued.

Shaking his head as he threw Batarang one the monster with wings extended, swooping down to pick a child. It exploded horrifically. "That's not what it looks like." He disputed.

Green Lantern merely snorted as he replied. "You should worry about yourself. You are the one without powers."

"Wait! Batman doesn't have powers?" Flash asked feeling rather alarmed by this revelation.

Seeing as this could undermine their quickly developing teamwork, Naruto jumped in saying. "No, but he has better training than all of you. He's also a better tactician and leader than the rest of us."

"I didn't pick him to be in charge." Green Lantern refused.

"No one did, yet he is the only one whose really stepped up for the role." Naruto pointed out. He personally could've taken up the role, but from what little he had observed both today and over the past few weeks. Batman was a far better strategist and leader, in a way the Bat themed hero reminded Naruto of Shikamaru Nara and Shikaku Nara when it came to strategy, data analysis and formulating brilliant plans. A scary thought, considering he just and ordinary human that trained themselves till they were pushing the limits.

"That's not entirely true. You have leadership qualities of your own." Batman pointed out.

Naruto did not deny, instead replying. "That's true, but they are inferior to yours."

"All your copies seemed to obey you just fine Sage." Green Lantern said, more cause he wanted anyone but Batman to be the team leader. With greater preferences for himself to take the role.

"Of course they would, they are all me. Besides, micromanaging them across the country and possibly the world will take a hell of lot less effort than truly leading a team of strangers who barely know anything about each other. Yet Batman has already started analyzing our strength's and weakness as well as the most effective ways to deploy us against the enemy and win. Make no mistake people, this world is at war and this team needs someone to lead us through it. I vote Batman, at least until someone more suitable shows up...that is if such a person even exists."

Superman who had flown closer to join the conversation thanks to the reduction of monsters in the area, courtesy of Naruto's clones, said. "Sage has a point, and he's the guy whose given us enough breathing room to actually talk and come up with a plan. Of us all, I feel Batman has come up with the most plans to deal with the problem and shown a greater understanding of the world and the enemies way of thinking than the rest of us. Not to mention that he did all this, while we were fighting. so I'll second Sage's vote."

"Batman is pretty smart but for the record, I can out think all of you combine if I wanted to. My mind works thousands of times faster than yours, but its geared towards science, not military strategy and leadership. Batman has my vote." Flash chipped in.

Seeing that the rest of us had voted on a leader, Green Lantern huffed as he threw his hands in the air, before turning to Batman and saying. "I'm not gonna say it Spooky. But I'm clearly outvoted here, so for now if you lead I'll follow."

Batman nodded, a small smile on his lips before it shifted back to a more serious look as he said. "In that case, we need to shut down the portals here in Metropolis first."

"I don't know about shutting them down, but I can create barriers around the portals that will trap anything that exit's them." Naruto offered.

"Can your clones create these barriers too." Batman inquired.

Nodding his head, Naruto replied."Yes. They can do just about anything I can do."

"Good, Flash you will scout out the city and find any portals, Naruto have your clones begin sealing of the portals. Lantern, I want you in the air, you are shiny, so I need you to keep those monsters attention focused on you. That will keep them away from civilians. Use Hit and Run tactics, make them chase you." Batman rattled off a bunch of orders.

"I will give you a couple of clones to help." Naruto offered to Green Lantern who nodded at him in gratefulness.

"And what about me?" Superman asked, curious about his role in this sudden turn of events.

"Civilians. You are their last line of defense. Two of the orders Sage gave to his clones, were securing civilians and gathering valuable intel. Once Flash is done with locating portals he will need to find a spot further in land but within the city limits that can hold millions of people. Flash and some clones of Sage will then evacuating who ever they can find to there. You will guard them, you can also use your superhearing and your ability to see through walls to spot anyone in need of help, then direct Flash or Sage there." Batman explained, Superman nodding, surprisingly content with his role.

"What about you Batman." Naruto chose to ask, so far he was dishing out orders and roles for the rest of the team but had yet to say anything about what he was going to do.

"I will be re-tasking a couple of satellites to other cities and parts of the globe, to figure out where we go next and what strategy to implement there. I'll also need to find a way to get the US and other governments off our asses while we work." Batman explained.

"W-wait a minute! You have a satellite." Green Lantern exclaimed in disbelief.

"About a dozen actually." Batman replied with smirk before adding. "What? My superpower is being rich. But enough jokes, after we settle things here we are going to Washington D.C next."

"Gotham is closer, and you are from Gotham. Aren't you worried about protecting your city?" Superman asked.

Batman paused, and Naruto could sense that he was troubled by the thought. However it was only for a moment, they could all here the steel in his resolve as he replied. "I am. But if Gotham falls, its just one dead city. If the Capital falls, we are looking at the fall of America itself."

Sighing tiredly, Naruto sat down, crossing his legs while saying. "In that case, I better start gathering energy for more clones. If I gather enough natural energy from the planet, I can deploy clones all across the globe. They will at the very least be able to keep the monsters distracted long enough for us to get there. Though this will take a lot out of me, and since you're rich, you mind paying for my vacation when this is over, cause I am going to need one."

"Pick a private island. I'll buy it and build a mansion for you to relax on." Batman replied in a dead serious tone, making Naruto and the other pause.

Exasperated by the rich superheroes response, Naruto pointed out. "You know I was joking right. That last bit about vacation I mean."

"Oh, I know." Batman said with a smirk.

VvV

It had been over half an hour since the monsters had started attacking, and Princess Diana of Themyscira had carved a bloody trail from Washington all the way to Metropolis, with naught but her sword and golden lasso in hand. Hundreds had already been saved by her on this trek, and the monsters instinctively understanding the threat she was, prioritized her over the civilians. In fact, the more she fought, the more were drawn towards her, so she felt comfortable leaving the civilians behind. It helped that Colonel Steve Trevor, the first male she had ever laid eyes on, was helping direct the local military defenses against the monsters, so it wasn't like these people didn't have any defenders whatsoever.

As an Amazon Princess, it was her duty to exterminate any monsters threatening man's world wherever she found them. And she had overheard a Lieutenant report to the Colonel that large swarms of the monsters were flying towards Metropolis for some reason. With that knowledge Diana had located the nearest map and made a beeline, straight for the so called "City of Tomorrow", killing thousands of monsters along the way.

When she finally arrived on the outskirts of Metropolis, Diana witnessed what had to be the most bizarre battle of her entire 1500 years of life. It was chaos everywhere as two armies clashed in bloody battle. On one side fought the invading monsters, too numerous to properly count there numbers in the heat of battle, but easily well over ten thousand. Some filled the air like a swarm of giant locusts, while others attacked from the ground.

From their mouths spewed orange flames, hot enough to turn the ground molten and set the surrounding forests and buildings ablaze. Yet for all their numbers the monsters were completely unable to set even one foot into the city limits due to the opposing army. If the invading army was an endless swarm, this new rival army was ruthless efficiency given form.

The opposing army was comprised of blond haired warriors in dark clothing, wielding strange triangular knives and some of the most impressive hand to hand combat skills she had ever seen. Their hand to hand was better than anything she had been taught on Themyscira and his blade work with those knives was equally impressive. It was clear to see even from a great distance that every single one of them had been wielding those knives for a life time.

Diana had the sudden urge to cross blades with these strange warriors and test their skills for herself. However such thoughts were forgotten as she took a closer look at the warriors. They were all similar, far too similar for it to be natural. It was as if she was staring at copies of the same person, and the more she looked, the more it became apparent that all of them really were the same. A singular being she eventually concluded, yet she was impressed by how all the copies were acting independently of each other.

Their unnatural nature was further proven when one of the copies was overwhelmed and took an unlucky blow to the gut, getting its intestines shredded. Instead of bleeding out on floor with horrific screams coming from his mouth, like such an injury demanded, their was a burst of smoke as the copy simply vanished out of existence. _'Magic. Extremely powerful magic.'_ She concluded.

Meanwhile all the other copies of the warrior flinched and rubbed their stomachs as if feeling the pain of there counterparts demise. Their retribution for the death of the fallen copy was equally swift and painful for the enemy. In the blink of an eye, several monsters had there limbs, torso's and heads sliced off or apart and bled out. She was even able to catch one of the blond warrior copies split one of the monsters from chin to crotch with a sword made of wind. It was an application of magic she had never heard of, wind didn't just cut things, it pushed, it buffeted, it carried, it did not slice like Amazonian steel.

Not wanting to get caught in the crossfire of the major battle, Diana tried to sneak through an area of the battlefield that was less chaotic. She made good progress, cutting down any monsters in her way and was even on the brink of entering the city limits. However, she must not have been paying as much attention to her surrounding as she normally would, because just as she crossing an abandoned street, she was suddenly ambushed by a dozen of the monsters. They must have had the same idea as her or something, that is if they could think.

Though surprised, she was prepared to cut them all down, she had faced hundreds of their kind on her way here so twelve more were of no concern to her. As she was preparing to engage them in battle though, Diana felt a sudden bout of vertigo and for a moment her vision darkened as the world blurred and twisted in unnatural ways. When her vision cleared again she found herself standing on a roof, a little further within the city limits.

Below, in the street where she was previously standing was a copy of the warrior fighting the monster. It had been horrifically skewered by multiple clawed hands, but instead of exploding in smoke like the other had, this one stuck out his tongue in a childish manner without a care in the world for the fact it was literally skewered to death. Then right before her eyes, the copy turned into pure lightning. _'By Zeus, that's enough lightning to cook the monsters in their armor.'_ She thought in amazement as she watched exactly that happen to all twelve monsters.

"Lightning Shadow Clones are pretty impressive, aren't they?" A voice said from behind her.

Spinning around she found another one of the blonde warriors behind her whom she immediately asked. "Who are you?"

She was relatively sure that he had no intention to harm, especially after he had gone out of his way to save her, though it wasn't actually necessary. The blond warrior merely gave her friendly smile and replied. "My name is Naruto Uzumaki, but I go by the codename Sage for now. I take it you are that lady from Washington, the one everyone is calling Wonder Woman? From your stance I can tell that you are a real warrior and even though I did it, my gut is telling me that saving you was completely unnecessary."

"I am Diana, Princess of Themyscira, and yes I am a warrior, an Amazon warrior. I take it you are the original." She then gestured to the army of other blondes still fighting off the invading monsters. "I've seen a number of your copies explode in smoke or lightning when they die." She announced to his amusement.

Shaking his head the now named Naruto replied. "Unfortunately, no. I am but a temporary copy created by the original Naruto Uzumaki with his memories and fighting abilities to keep this horde monsters at bay. The real Sage is with the other hero's and warriors further in the city, he is gathering energy to fuel our existence coordinating the different armies of clones all across the city. Our job is to keep the enemy at bay, while he and the others like us come up with a plan to deal with the invasion and evacuate the civilians. I would request you meet up with them, they have a plan in place and sooner rather than later we will need your skills as a warrior to win this war. This war is a global even and we fear that the worst is yet to come."

Nodding upon hearing this and marveling at the fact that all the Naruto's she could see were a single person fighting all across the city, she then replied. "Then I will be on my way, Sage. It was a pleasure to meet you."

"Likewise, my friend." Naruto replied with a charming smile before leaping of into the midst of the fray. With a smile Wonder Woman turned towards the heart of the city and began to sprint as fast as she could towards this assemblage of warriors and heroes. If things were only going to get worse from here on out, then she needed to be at heart of the matter, where she could best thrust her blade into the problem.

TBC...

* * *

I hope you enjoyed the first chapter of Sage of War. Next time the League gather's together with a surprise addition, we get to see more of how the Justice League counters the invading Parademons with Naruto help and Darkseid decides FUBAR their plan, by merely showing. Please leave a review and tell me what you think.

Scarlet Out!


	2. Chapter 2: Dawn of a Legend!

Pairing: Naruto/Supergirl/Wonder-Woman/Grail/Mera/Shay Veritas/Zatanna/Poison Ivy/Donna Troy/?

Disclaimer: I do not own the Naruto franchise or DC comics. I simply do this for fun and to improve myself as writer.

**A/N:** Thank you so much for such an enthusiastic response to this story. Seriously this is the most reviews I have ever gotten for a single chapter, lets not even talk about favorites and follows, which mind you are a lot. I am so happy you guys liked it so much and i appreciate your thoughts and opinions left in the reviews.

That said, I am also really sorry this took so long. I intend to get it out sooner but Endgame, Mortal Kombat 11 and a ton people at the organization I volunteer at suddenly being sent to Francistown, Botswana left the organization shorthanded and me really busy. Thankfully I've adjusted and will be able to put more time into writing.

Anyway, it seems a lot of you utterly despise the "no killing rule" in DC comics. Well I will say this, Naruto is not going to be murder happy or anything. If there is a way to end things without killing he will go for such solutions. That said, there are things he can do that will make him simply killing a villain seem like a mercy. So there will be no tolerating mass murderers, and after he hands them over to the police two or three times and they continue to break out of prison and kill. Said mass murder might find themselves on a one way trip to Apokolips or some other hellish dimension, without anyone knowing about it. He will also straight up disintegrate you in public if you go after his family. Family is kind of his berserk button, and if you mess with that, you're a dead man or woman.

Another thing I wanted to bring up was that all those reviews and PM's were quite informative and I have made some changes based on suggestions and opinions offered. Minor things really, I wont spoil them so if you recognize something suddenly popping up that you suggested, keep it between yourself and me. The one thing I will say however will be in regards to Wonder Woman and Mera.

After going through tons of Aquaman and Wonder Woman comics, especially Wonder Woman. I've come to the conclusion that I can't make the New 52 storyline my canon without majorly affecting Rebirth and everything after that. So I am just gonna mix it up in my own unique blend. So many storylines will deviate from what happened in the comics even further than I originally intend just to make it all fit. In other words, both the New 52 origin and Rebirth origin of Diana are true, or at least the parts of them that I like, and with that in mind it will affect how Wonder Woman and many other characters act and think, creating a few differences from the comic. Something that you will begin to see in this chapter.

Also Mera is sort a mix of the character from the comics, the Aquaman movie, the Justice League Throne of Atlantis animated movie and Young Justice animated series. Her powers, clothing, mindset and personality are drawn from all these sources. She still very much going to have some Ocean related adventures as seen in the comics but her story is going to be wildly different thanks to Naruto. Naruto's arrival altered the Prime Earth timeline, not only in the present but the past. A certain blue naked man wont be too happy about that.

**AlbatrossWearer:** Its not just that he came out of the war changed that makes him come off as serious, but that he instinctively understands he likely wont ever see home again. That's affecting him deeply on an emotional level. He also wants to impress the other heroes who are better known, and is applying everything he learned in the war.

**Kira444:** Its...ugh! I was really into her comics before New 52, and they haven't really improved through Rebirth. They brought up a bunch of interesting concepts admittedly but messed up even those. I really don't like thinking about it.

**TypedSomeWords:** Its really hard to reply to your reviews without spoiling things. They always so insightful or predictive of what I am thinking, in some way.

**doomqwer:** No comment!

**kival737101:** Sorry but as much as I agree with you and I took some time to think about it, Cat Grant is way to successful, ordinary and untraumatized for her to work using the model I created for the harem.

**Mindbreaker101:** You will see in this chapter.

**Eavise:** That's a weird situation there, but Naruto will be personally invested in keep Joker and Harley as far away apart as possible.

Okay enough responding to reviews, lets get on to the story. I really hope you enjoy it and please leave a review at the end.

* * *

Chapter 2: Dawn of a Legend!

"_It was merely desperation in the world's hour of need that brought us together. That desperation led to a team capable of doing together, what no one of us could've managed on our own, and we saved the world in the process. However, where desperation brought us together, its our desire to protect what we cherish most that keeps this team fighting, no matter the odds. And trust me when I say, we jealously protect what we care about, regardless of the personal cost to us."_

— **Naruto Uzumaki **on the formation of theJustice League

**oOo**

**A small Park in Midvale, Metropolis...**

Diana raised her sword, the flat of her blade deflecting a staccato of shuriken aimed at her vitals while her left hand blocked a trio of bicycle kicks aimed for her head. Grabbing the offending limb, she slammed her attacker towards the ground in retaliation, her divine strength ensuring that the collision would crack it on impact, except it didn't. In a display of impressive flexibility, the Naruto clone she was fighting twisted around in mid-air and brought his hands down into a handstand to halt the devastating impact, then his free leg whipped out low and at her feet.

Distracted with deflecting a kunai that was simultaneously thrown at her heart by one of Naruto's free hands, Diana missed the ninja's leg and got knocked off her feet. Despite the tactic catching her off guard, Princess Diana still had the presence of mind to kick Naruto away from her even as she fell onto her back. The kick was instantly blocked but still powerful enough to send him skidding through the grass, away from her. Unwilling to give him chance to recover the Amazon princess rolled to her feet and pursued him.

Unfortunately Naruto with a fancy kick-up was on his feet almost as soon as she was, and charged right back at her with impressive speed. Her sword flashed down in a stroke to cleave him apart from crown to crotch and was promptly blocked by two kunai covered in golden chakra. The clash of weapons proving powerful enough disperse the air around them in a small shockwave, and crack the ground beneath their feet. Naruto grinned at this, his blood clearly pumping as they enjoyed the haze of battle, Diana's own face mirroring his expression.

A second later, steel clashed between them repeatedly at speeds that were dizzying as Diana attacked, defended and countered almost simultaneously. Blow after the blow she was pushed to the edge of her swordsmanship by Naruto and his knife work. Finally after what had to be the 50th such clash, Naruto's kunais shattered in his hands. She smirked and tried to decapitate him but he ducked low and spun into a reverse sweep kick.

Diana back flipped over it, her hand reaching to her hip for her lasso and then slinging the magical rope at Naruto who was caught off guard as it wrapped around his neck choking him. She jerked it and he came flying at her, where she reared her hand back and unleashed a devastating punch at him. It was the kind of blow that should've sent him flying through a building or two upon connecting, instead he burst into smoke and saw dust, his body replaced by a splintered log.

As she landed, Diana flipped her sword into a reverse grip and stabbed backwards while ducking low. It was just in the nick of time as two more kunai passed through where her jugular had been, meanwhile her blade sank deep into Naruto's belly where he had materialized behind her. Looking back at the blonde ninja as he coughed up blood from the fatal wound, he smiled in a sickening way and said. "Well done."

Then the clone exploded in a puff of smoke that quickly faded away along with all the blood covering his and Diana's bodies. Diana sighed warily at the result of the fight, recalling how this had all started.

She had come across a trio of clones while making her way towards the group of heroes the Naruto clone she had conversed with earlier in the evening had mentioned. The trio were in the midst of protecting a small family from some Parademons that had snuck into the city through the sewers, and they were being overwhelmed. While the clones where far more skillful, the Invaders had the numbers, and the three clones found themselves unable to fight back and effectively protect the family at the same. That is until Diana dropped in from the sky like an avenging angel and made short work of the Parademons. And that's when she came to a several realizations.

These new clones knew that Diana existed and was an ally, but little else about her purpose. Something that didn't initially make sense since they were the same person as the clone she had initially talked to. That is, until one of the clones revealed that Naruto's clones were not psychically linked to each other like a hive-mind, though upon their deaths or dispersal they did transfer their memories and knowledge to all the remaining clones and the original.

The Naruto clone she had first talked to simply had not died or disperse yet, meaning that none of the other clones knew the details of why she was here or what she had been told to do by the clone she interacted with. So Diana had been forced to take a minute to reiterate her purpose and the information to one of the clones, who made an additional clone before dispelling it and relaying the message to the original. The clone had also filled her in on the fact that every time they made a clone it halved their energy, this explained why they hadn't summoned more clones to themselves when faced with the Parademons.

Then their were the Parademons themselves. She hadn't recognized what they were at first, her mother Queen Hippolyta had made sure to keep Diana out of the archive's regarding Apokolips and its evil ruler. But as she and the Naruto clones where slaughtering the group of Parademons emerging from the sewers, one of them hand yelled. "For Darkseid!"

Those two words had clarified everything for her. Apokolips and the New Gods where not a topic that Diana was very familiar with, her education focusing on the gods of Earth, particularly her patrons the Olympians. But she was familiar enough with the name Darkseid to know who he was, every Amazon knew that name. They had standing orders to kill him if possible.

Queen Hippolyta had done her best to keep her child ignorant of the dangers of Apokolips, to preserve Diana's childhood, however Diana had still managed to hear snippets over the years about past conflicts with the agents of Darkseid. It surprised her to learn that at one time Amazons were being specifically trained to kill him, not that any had succeeded. And now, the world was being invaded by the Parademon armies of Apokolips, beings that she had only previously heard of in stories told by the older Amazon's. She also knew that they were an enemy that could not be negotiated with and that Darkseid would desire nothing less than the destruction of this world.

Shaking her her head to clear them of such thoughts, Diana had no intention of letting that happen. Of course it all hinged on the cooperation of Naruto Uzumaki's clones who had insisted on them sparring so that they could see her skills in person before they would allow her to join the others, this being the last of nearly a dozen such little spars. Each clone death prompting more clones to show up and continue testing her, some stronger than others, all of them extremely dangerous cause they did not hold back. He had even encouraged her to fight him like she meant to kill him, and so she did. Diana had only agreed to that particular request because they were clones and their deaths were meaningless.

"Was all this necessary Naruto? My fighting skills would've been put to better use fighting the Parademons, than a mere spar." Diana asked unable to keep her displeasure from her tone, despite the fact that she had enjoyed the fight immensely. The two had become quite familiar with each other over the series of spars and referred to each other by their actual names rather than superhero names.

"I apologize for the frustration this has cause Diana, but trust me, it was necessary." Naruto apologized, giving her a grave look to indicate how serious he was. "The truth is our little team is too new for its members to trust each other wholeheartedly. And barring some kind of calamity it will take time for us to build that trust. That said, the original Naruto, Flash, Superman, Green Lantern and Batman have been fighting side by side for a few hours now, and they at least trust each other enough to work towards a common goal without the fear of being stabbed in the back. More specifically being stabbed in the back by me, they will not afford you that same trust easily. Especially since you are not yet a very active vigilante even though you have been dubbed Wonder Woman in the news."

"Why not?" Diana asked, calming down as Naruto continued to explain his reasoning. It did kind of make sense. With the whole world under attack, it definitely wasn't the easiest time to just trust a stranger. Still, you had to take some thing on faith when so many lives hung in the balance.

"Cause you are like me, a warrior first, before a hero. You are powerful and you are willing to kill to protect what you cherish, something that Batman will immediately recognize, and the rest will not appreciate. They on the other hand, are heroes who believe in systems and in bringing Justice through the law. Unfortunately this is a war with an enemy from beyond this world, their systems and Justice don't cover this. They need people like you and me to win this war, and they know it, but that doesn't mean they like it. Everything is changing too quickly for their taste and they haven't had time to adapt, thus it will take time before they will be willing to really trust us, and until such a time they will treat you, myself and anyone new with suspicion and reluctant cooperation. All of that is time that is time wasted that nobody really has with the whole world currently being invaded." Naruto finished explaining.

"That's foolishness." Diana blurted out, she found the whole thing both understandable and completely ridiculous. Caution was warranted but billions of lives were at stake, so their was no room for petty mistrust. Then again, the others didn't know what kind of threat Darkseid was.

Naruto merely nodded in agreement as he responded. "I know, which is why I figured that this method would be easier. They trust me enough cause I've proven myself and continually am proving myself to them. Add to that the fact that I have personally tested your skills and that we are both familiar with each others fighting style due to our earlier spar, it will be easier for them to accept you if I say you are with me. I can vouch for your skill and work with you for easier during deployment under Batman's leadership, without the awkward deliberations of whether or not you are a trustworthy individual."

Diana nodded her head in acceptance of his reasoning but still asked with a bit of challenge in her voice. "And what about you? Are you claiming that you not suspicious of my intentions even if you've never met me before? Not that I don't appreciate your pragmatism and kindness so far."

Naruto merely chuckled at her words before replying. "I can sense good in you, just like I can sense evil and cruelty from the Parademons, oh, and I mean that quite literally. I don't know your exact intentions but I do know you want to help. With the current state of the world, I believe that's enough to give you the benefit of the doubt. Besides, the others aren't bad people, they've just never had to use their powers in war and trust strangers they've never met to protect their backs."

The way he said it, with his soft charisma and the aura of gentle kindness surrounding him, there was no question in Diana's mind that he was being completely honest with her. In fact Diana surprised herself when before she could even think of what she was saying, she said. "You're a good man Naruto Uzumaki."

"Thanks, but that's something you should really be telling the original. Every clone is just a portion of his self made manifest, some of us have more of his better parts, others have less. But he is the only one who is real and thus worth being judged." The clone replied in an amused tone before continuing with. "Anyway, you beat my clone brethren fair and square, so the original will probably signal for us soon to come over. Until then, lets get to higher ground, you will be able to observe him and the team better from there. Its also a good opportunity to familiarize yourself with how they all operate, for when you have to work with anyone other than me. Oh and one more thing."

"yes, what is it." She ask curiously.

The clone held out his hand, a golden flame of chakra manifested in it as he handed it to Diana who looked at it warily. Smirking at this he said. "Take it, it wont bite. It's just a bit of my power, for all the energy you spent up while fighting me in our sparring session earlier. It will revitalize you and maybe even give you a slight boost."

Warily taking his hand Diana felt the flame engulf her and then rush into her. Something within her seemed to at first reject the flame and try to push it out, but after a moment it did a 180 and accepted it. A connection of some kind was made within her and then everything seemed to turn white as the world seemed to fade away from her mind. The invasion happening around the world, her worries about never seeing Themyscira again, her concern about her friends Barbara Ann Minerva, Steve Trevor and Eta Candy. All of it just was just gone, and all that was left was power. Raw, untamed and utterly euphoric power.

"Its amazing." She gasped, feeling more complete than she ever had, more powerful than she ever was.

Diana briefly recalled what it was like before her gods had visited her in her Jail cell and gifted her with her divine abilities such as super-strength, super-speed, durability, accelerated healing, longevity and more. But what she felt now was beyond even that, it was as if something that was already in her for some reason, had merely been unlocked by Naruto's golden flames.

Opening her eyes her already enhanced senses courtesy of Artemis, seemed even better than usual. She felt tough, stronger, more full of energy and like she could do things that she previously couldn't. Something that was confirmed when small sparks of electricity seemed to crawl all over her skin like she had been touched by Zeus himself.

"Diana, what's happening?" Naruto asked sounding alarmed.

Her gaze turned Naruto who took a step back. She ignored this, more surprised that not only could she see the familiar bond in impressive detail, but actually feel him right next to her, like her she had had some other extra sense activated. Remembering his question she asked. "What do you mean?"

"Your eyes are glowing with electricity." Naruto responded, still looking warily at her before adding in concern. "Are you okay?"

She smiled back at him beatifically as she replied. "I feel perfect. This is your doing?"

Naruto shook his head as he said. "I merely gave you a bit of power to help you recover. This however, is all you, its as if..." He trailed off quickly getting lost in thought.

Diana didn't like that, Naruto seemed to have answers so she insisted. "As if what?"

Naruto shrugged before saying. "Last time my powers activated like this it was negatively and to protect me...i think." He didn't sound too sure about that. "Now though, I can tell that whatever my powers just did, it was trying to help you. There is something in you Diana, something divine."

Diana was surprised that this man could not only sense but identify that the nature of her powers were divine. _'Perhaps he is connected to the divine world in some way. He is quite powerful after all.'_ She thought to herself before deciding to tell him a bit about herself. "The Olympian gods are the one's that gave me my powers."

Naruto seemed more shocked by her answer than anything that had happened to him in the time they had spent together and blurted out. "Wait, they're real? I thought they were just a bunch of stories for children and historians, when I read up on them in the library. The books certainly made it seem so."

Diana smiled at the fact that even this blonde warrior with so many different abilities could be completely caught of guard by something, before replying. "They been gone from the world for some time now, but they are very real. They are the source of my power." She didn't elaborate on that.

"Well then, that explains a lot, but we can talk about this when the world's not in danger, lets get going." He said before crouching and jumping to the roof of a nearby building and then to a taller building further away. Diana mimicked his actions with ease and quickly followed, still marveling at this new power she had unlocked with his help. She would need to figure out how it worked soon.

VvV

**Glenmorgan Square, New Troy, Metropolis...**

Two pencil thin beams of solar energy lanced through the air and rapidly severed the limbs and heads of several of the invaders, freeing up some space for Sage who had been surrounded by hundreds of the monsters to fight freely. In gratitude the blond ninja threw a hail of kunai covered in lightning chakra at a dozen monsters trying to surround Superman in the air and overwhelm him. The ninja weapons cleanly punching through dozens of the invaders, armor and all, as if they weren't even there. Superman grimaced at the lethal attack but said nothing.

Their was no time for words between the heroes so Naruto nodded in acknowledgment of the assist but Superman ignored him and flew to a higher altitude of 400 meters, attracting numerous monsters towards him, leaving Naruto with even more room to maneuver on the ground. Sighing at the dismissal, Naruto focused on his job. The team of heroes had all been assigned their objective by Batman, Naruto and Superman were tasked with being the bait, while the rest of the team were parts of trap Batman had set to deal with an overwhelming force of the invaders that had either broken through Naruto's clone perimeter or snuck into the city via other means.

Reengaging the nearest monsters in combat, Naruto swiftly ducked under a clawed swing that would've sheered through steel before driving his knee into his attacker's chest. It staggered back a step, enough distance for him to jump and unleash a devastating spinning hook kick, ripping its head clean off and sending it flying. The ninja was far from done however.

His feet barely touched the ground before he was tackled to the floor by the next monster. It died a second later as Naruto rolled with the tackle, till he was on top of the monster, and then brought his fist down in devastating punch to its jaw, snapping its neck and pulping most of its face. Rolling to his feet, Naruto threw himself into a butterfly twist to avoid a conflagration from over a dozen monsters that incinerated his last victim. Wiping his hands around he created a shockwave that instantly put the flames out, before grabbing a monster trying sneak up and punch him from behind by the arm, and flipped it over his shoulder.

The asphalt cracked beneath the creatures weight, but Naruto had more to do. Grabbing its leg, he swung the creature around in low circle, enough to knock over three of the dozen of its kin, that had tried to incinerate him. He then flung it at the eight who came charging in behind, bowling them all over. A mass of blue chakra bloomed in his palm as a Rasengan formed, which he simply dropped in the general direction of the twelve monsters and then turned his back to them. It instantly destabilized and then detonated violently enough that the sheer force of the explosion all but liquefied their bodies.

Grimacing at the foul smell and the thousand's more monsters that still needed killing, Naruto felt a sigh of relief as the Flash suddenly zipped into existence, golden lightning trailing behind him. In an instant, over a thousand of the invading monsters suddenly found small shaped bricks attached to their bodies. And before they could even comprehend what the heck was going on, Batman who was on the roof of a nearby 5 story building, raised his right hand with a detonator in it, and pressed down on a big red button.

Fire and thunder bloomed across the street turned battlefield, as limbs, organs and other body parts rained down around Naruto and the Flash who actively dodged it all. Then without so much as another word, Batman jumped off the building spreading his cloak that took the shape of Bat wings as he glided back to the command outpost he had created earlier. An advanced computer system lay their that had been delivered by the Flash from Gotham, from it Batman was monitoring the war all across the world.

With his job on the ground complete, Naruto brought his attention to the air, awaiting the next phase of the plan. Batman had tasked him with keeping the ground forces busy long enough for Flash to put shaped explosive charges on all of the monsters. Flash and a clone of Naruto had raided every army base within 1000 miles for the explosive clay that was ironically named C-4 and reminded Naruto of Deidara. Then they had raided electrical stores for some plastic chips they called receivers or something along those lines.

With a little instruction from Batman, the Flash had then mass produced the small bombs with his super-speed. Meanwhile Naruto had a few clones raiding every single pizza store and fast food joint in town to provide the Flash with a steady intake of calories while he worked. It was a bizarre request in Naruto's opinion, but if it kept the speedster working then who was he to judge, there was after all much work for Flash to do.

From there it was just a matter of finding large pockets of the monsters that were either still lurking within the city limits due to staying hidden, or had somehow gotten pasts his clone perimeter. After luring them into an area with the challenge of a good fight, they could then be easily tagged by Flash and taken out _en _masse with a simple button press. The whole operation was even made simpler by the fact that the invading monsters actively chose to fight the strongest or most dangerous individual. So by a not entirely unanimous decision, Naruto and Superman were chosen to be the bait to lure them in. Then once the small army of invader's was dealt with, they merely had to rinse and repeat.

It was a simple but very efficient plan, that Batman had come up with and had worked four times so far without fail. However everything that had happened so far once only half the plan, now it was time for Naruto to move on to phase two of the strategy, the part which dealt with the invaders in the sky.

Above them the skyline turned green as Green Lantern descended from the clouds were he had been hiding. Superman had all but gathered every single one of the monsters still flying to himself, as they tried to overpower him with numbers or at least hold him in place, a futile effort. A giant fishbowl bloomed around the Man of Steel and all the monsters fighting him in the air. Funneling them all into one area with only one exit, which the monsters were too distracted to use.

"Sage! Superman, now!" Batman ordered over the comm device he had handed Naruto, as the godslaying ninja moved to complete the objective.

Another Rasengan bloomed in his hand, this one golden. Naruto quickly added wind chakra to the destructive technique his father had invented, giving it its trademark shrill bell like ring as the Rasengan morphed into a Rasenshuriken and then into a Big Ball Rasenshuriken. It was music to his ears and a death sentence to nearly anything organic that got caught in the technique's path. It was also the technique that had earned him some silent condemnation from both Flash and Superman.

None of the other heroes had been prepared for the destructive nature of the technique the first time they saw him use it. However Superman and Flash in particular had been horrified beyond belief upon seeing the devastating effect of the technique had on another living being, thanks to their unique abilities. It just so happened that they couldn't really complain due to the lives at stake and the fact that it was also the perfect technique for wiping out large groups of the monsters. That didn't stop them from giving him the cold shoulder and treating him with suspicion.

Superman upon hearing the sound, knew it was time to get out of there, just as he had done the last four times they did this. With a medium exertion of his incredible strength, the alien hero scattered the monster's trying to latch on to his body, then he sped out of the mouth of the fishbowl. Green Lantern's construct instantly morphed into a full sphere with only a small opening, just big enough for Naruto's technique.

Seeing this, Naruto flicked his wrist and sent the ultimate Wind Release technique on its merry way, right through that opening which promptly disappeared afterwards. The whole giant construct morphing into a perfect sphere, trapping thousands of the monsters inside for what few seconds they had left to live. Green Lantern had assured Naruto that the force-fields he created were all but indestructible, Naruto didn't believe that for a second. However the last couple of times they had tried this, they had found out that those force-fields would hold out against at least this level of destruction, more than enough time to keep the technique contained.

The Rasenshuriken tore right through the monsters like tissue paper, till it got right into the center of them. A place where hundreds of them were located, then it expanded. A torrent of trillions upon trillions of microscopic golden razor sharp wind blades capable of cutting things at the cellular level, tore through every single one of the monsters present. Reducing them to microscopic particles in mere seconds. By the time the technique had run its course, their wasn't even blood left.

Green Lantern released the force-field seconds after the technique ended, with a sigh of relief and a slightly exhausted hunch in his shoulder's before looking at Naruto and saying. "And you said you invented that? Why would you need to create such a monstrously powerful attack?"

"I needed to permanently kill an immortal zombies bounty hunter that refused to stay dead and stole living people's still beating hearts." Naruto shrugged, ignoring Green Lantern's incredulous look at his reply, but said no more on the issue. There was no need to give out any more details on the technique, like how he could up its power to basically nuke mountain ranges out of existence if he so wished. No need to alienate himself further from the heroes than he had already done.

They wanted him to reveal more of himself, and he had when he explained a few of the lighter details of the Rasenshuriken, as well as naming himself as its inventor. But it left both Superman and Flash almost immediately wary of him when he used it the first time. Batman and Green Lantern now both shared this wariness, but where more practical enough not to let it hinder their team work and interactions since they were in the middle of a war.

It seemed that explaining that the Rasenshuriken was created to kill an immortal zombie bounty hunter, mollified both Green Lantern and Batman who was listening in from his post, a little. Even if technically he hadn't created the Rasenshuriken specifically for Kakuzu but rather to get stronger, the immortal had still been the first target and the Rasenshuriken had been needed for that mission.

Before Green Lantern could further question on him on what he had just said, Batman announced over comms. "Sage, Flash, Lantern, Superman, regroup with me. I have an update on the current situation that you need to hear!"

Naruto sighed as he and the others moved to hear what the leader of their ragtag group had to say. At least they had defeated all the monsters currently in the city. Not that doing so would change much if things continued the way they were. Thankfully, according to clone that had just dispelled Diana was ready to step in and reinforce them.

VvV

"Focus on the mission Arth...your Majesty." Mera corrected herself with a cold, almost dead tone as she berated King Orin for getting distracted in the midst of their brief skirmish with the otherworldly demons invading the seven seas through portals.

In response to this Arthur Curry guided dozens of Great White Sharks to tear the demons apart with his telepathy. Likewise with a thought, Mera froze whatever demons survived in spheres of solid water so highly pressurized the sphere might as well have been solid steel. Clenching her fists, the water imploded, painting it green with the inhuman blood of the demons.

"Don't be like that Mera! I am still just Arthur to you." The King of Atlantis said softly, in a tone that could even be called affectionate and had no place on the battlefield. In contrast to his soft words, the King of Atlantis reared his hand back and threw his seven pointed trident like a javelin at another demon, skewering it place. A burst of speed allowed him to swim over to the impaled demon in seconds, where he grabbed his trident and swiftly used it to bludgeon two more demons to death, that were attempting to catch him in a pincer maneuver. Finishing them off, he then turned back to Mera with that same gentle look that had once been reserved for only her and said. "I know tha...I know I hurt you Mera. I swear to Poseidon, I didn't mean for this to happen. It was not supposed to be this way, but me and Hila, I don't know how, but we just bonded."

His words were dripping with honest, there was no point in trying to deny anything to Mera anyway. She had been the one to find the two of them together, mere weeks from the wedding. After meeting him, Mera had fallen head over heels for Arthur and gotten to know him better than anyone else. The two had shared countless treasured moments together in which he had given her that same look, that same smile. She knew all of his expression and could read his emotions like a book, then less than a week ago, he had left her brokenhearted with his actions.

Now the Xebelian princess could never look at that gentle smile again the same way. Things could never go back to how they used to be, between them, not after such a betrayal. Now, his words did not soothe her emotions, instead they made her see red and she found herself using an almost godly amount of self control to simply take out her frustration and anger on the invading demons.

"You once were Arthur, my beloved fiance, but now you are just King Orin of Atlantis to me. I will obey your will my King and protect the interests of Atlantis, as is my duty. However, we are not friends your Majesty, and you are certainly not my fiance anymore, a decision that was entirely your choice." She said coldly, her tone tinged with bitterness and perhaps a touch of cruelty, judging by the way Arthur flinched at her words.

A part of her regretted it almost as soon as she said it, but she would not take back her words, and he deserved it for his betrayal. Turning her back to him, and thanking the ocean for hiding away the tears she felt like shedding, Mera added. "Now, I have invading demons to kill, and vent my anger on, so it would be very nice if you would just drop this matter and get moving to the next point of interest, the place the surface dwellers call Metropolis. You can make your pathetic apologies for sleeping with my sister after we clear the oceans of these foul invaders."

With that she sped away, subconsciously using her hydrokinesis to part the water around her and increase her swimming speed. Even so, King Orin quickly caught up to her, he was simply a more powerful swimmer. He looked sad and ashamed of himself, thankfully remaining silent as they continued their journey. _'Good, he should be ashamed. We were to be husband and wife in a month, and he breaks his vows with my own sister. If not for the damage such a scandal would create for an Alliance between Xebel and Atlantis, I would've shamed them both before the open courts of Atlantis. Now the best I can do is get as far away from them as possible.'_ She thought bitterly.

VvV

As he waited for everyone to join him, Bruce Wayne went over everything he had learned of Naruto Uzumaki aka Sage. It wasn't a very long list seeing as he'd only even become aware of the young man today, but it was alarming. The fact that he was a ninja, that alone made him dangerous and made Bruce Wayne wonder if he had connections to the League of shadows or some other equally dangerous organization. If so he would need to investigate them and their motives, as well as create countermeasures against them.

He also needed to know if there were other ninja's in this possible organization as powerful or even more so than Naruto. The blond had proven capable of super-hearing, super-speed, super-strength, incredible durability, flight, the creation of sentient copies of himself with all his abilities and skill-sets, the ability to project concentrated balls of rapidly revolving energy that exploded violently and much more. Sage, himself had even admitted that he had many more abilities he was keeping secret cause he didn't trust them enough to reveal those abilities. And then their was this latest idea one of his clones had come up with independently of the original.

Quite frankly the ninja was terrifying to Batman, maybe even more so than Superman. At least with Clark Kent he knew what he was dealing with, he knew enough about the alien's life to know that he had been raised well, and with good morals by his adoptive parents. So even if the Man of Steel was stronger than the planet, and capable of wiping out the entire human race, he would never do so willingly. Bruce's countermeasures merely had to take into consideration the unlikely scenario's in which a third party took control of Superman through mental domination or some other kind of manipulation. A far less challenging problem than dealing with Sage, Batman could not confidently say that Naruto had such strong morals or would be so easy to contain due to his numerous abilities.

With his team gathered, a team which Naruto had helped thrust him into the position of leader and representative to the rest of the world, Batman said. "Good job on taking out the monsters that got through Naruto's clone perimeter around the city. With some satellite imagery and computer data, I've analyzed the situation and come up with an assessment. The plan we created earlier this evening is working, but so far we are merely holding the line, and in one city at that."

"Its better than nothing Batman." Green Lantern spoke up. "This city alone has a population of eleven million and at most the monsters have only been able to abduct a few hundred. The rest of the world is not that lucky.

Nodding his head Bruce replied to Hal Jordan's comment with. "Indeed, and that's exactly the problem. These monsters roam free across the rest of the world, and while Sage has spread out his clones across the world to halt the invaders, they are a mere stopgap measure, and one that will not last forever. Even here where he has the most clones, they were briefly overrun by a massive wave of the monsters. Its simply further proof that our strategy isn't viable in the long run. These monster's continue to pour through their portals and their numbers continually rise, soon even Naruto will grow exhausted. Quite frankly we need something to turn the tide around and give us a chance of winning or at the very least stop us from losing before its too late."

"Any ideas on what could do that?" Flash asked.

"Sage's power isn't limitless, only Superman seems to hold that honor, but it is very versatile power regardless. One of his clones, made an interesting suggestion. The clone suggested that instead of digging in and fighting a pointless battle to keep these monsters out of the city, while waiting for military reinforcement. We can instead move the people somewhere safer and more defensible, so that the military can easily take over. The invaders have clearly shown that they are specifically targeting civilians for capture, likely in order to harvest us for some unknown purpose. In that case its more logical to move everyone to a more defensible position, to safe zones in the control of the various military's around the world. They won't protest at the chance to better protect their own citizens." Batman explained.

"It sounds good and all, but how the hell are we supposed to move them! None of us can carry enough people, fast enough to make a dent in the population of a large city, before the monsters arrive. Better yet, how will we convince the different governments around the world, that we are here to help, let alone that we can actually succeed at something like this. Cause unless something's changed in the last half an hour, super-powered folk – like us – are still being blamed for this whole mess to begin with." Green Lantern Said in an extremely skeptical tone, not having much faith in the plan at all.

Batman merely smirked and replied. "Leave that to me?"

"Leave that to you, buddy, you're a guy dressed up as a giant Bat. Ignoring the serious creep factor there, what government would deign to give you the time of the day, especially when you don't even have any powers?" Hal yelled in disbelief.

Humoring the Lantern, Bruce replied. "They will not have choice in the matter. Not after I finish hacking into every military and civilians satellites around the world, and certainly not after I send messages on every television, radio and Online RSS feed, in every language native to the region, telling people what to do and how they can get to safety. I've already figure out where to send everyone, I'll be telling their governments as a formality and so that their soldiers don't start shooting civilians when they suddenly pop out of thin air."

Pinching the bridge of his nose in exasperation, Hal Jordan much to Bruce's amusement muttered. "Why did I even ask?"

"Okay, I kind of get that you have a plan to enlist the cooperation of the different governments around the world, but that doesn't explain how you plan for us to move everyone. I maybe fast, but I can only carry a few people at a time. And running back and forth between cities all over the world and their designated safe zone would tire even me out quickly." Flash aired his concerns.

"That would be my job Flash." Naruto said with deep sigh, looking a little hesitant. It was obvious to Bruce that Sage was less than pleased that a clone, had gone behind his back and revealed something that Naruto wasn't quite ready to reveal to them. This knowledge was both interesting and valuable to the Gothamite.

When the clone had come to Bruce with his solution...well Batman hadn't known what to think really, aside from giving Naruto a higher threat rating than he had initially done. It was something that was so far outside of his area of experience that it seemed like a joke to him, but Naruto Uzumaki was being entirely truthful. This was the real deal, a solution to their problem that was both convenient and easily implement...well, easy for Naruto to implement, or so he implied.

With the lives of billions on the line Bruce accepted it and was unwilling to second guess it, but he couldn't help but feel a sense of trepidation. A sense that things wouldn't continue to go as easily as they had so far. Whether Naruto was the cause of these feelings or something else remained to be seen, but Bruce intended to keep a closer eye on the ninja. For now he watched as Naruto and the others interacted.

"What do you mean by that? You are already fighting these monsters with your clones, wont it put a strain on you to try and deal with transporting civilians as well?" Superman asked. The godlike alien, was despite his mistrust of Naruto willing to work with him for the greater good. Good, he needed them to work together. It was one thing to be suspicious of new comers and unknowns, it was another thing entirely turn down a helping hand when lives depended on it. Batman was glad that Clark wasn't that foolish.

"I can create markers which I can teleport people to." Sage announced in a resigned tone. Everyone but Batman immediately turning to him to stare in shock. Naruto however ignored this and continued, saying. "Don't look at me like that. I already told you I have other powers and more secrets that you will have to earn before I trust you with them. This is just one of those secret abilities I have, its not something I can use carelessly either, at least not on this scale."

There were grumbled from Flash and Green Lantern before Superman asked. "So you plan to basically shuffle around 7 billion people?"

Naruto snorted in amusement at the ridiculousness of that idea before replying. "I'm good, but not that good. If all goes well, it will be Hundreds of millions at the most, and mostly in major cities which are the invader's priority targets at the moment. Still, I need to find these people first, which is where Flash comes in."

"Me?" Flash asked in surprise, looking to Batman for confirmation.

With a nod of his head, Bruce said. "Yes. Your job is to find every last man, woman and child so that Sage's clones can teleport them. The way he explained it was that he needs to either be in physical contact or his energy must be in contact with whomever he's teleporting, and he can only send them to his markers. Which I believe your clones have finished distributing at the locations I gave?"

Sage frown and gained a far off look, as if his mind was elsewhere before replying. "Yes. All 10,000 of me are ready." His indication of the true number of clones he had created, shocked everyone present, and increased Batman's wariness of him a tad bit more, but it also reassured the Dark Knight that perhaps the world had a chance of being saved by the team.

_'Yes, Sage definitely needed a higher threat rating.'_ Bruce Wayne concluded before saying. "Well, you know your job's lets get to work."

VvV

**Tokyo, Japan...**

Tsugushima Yukio held her 6 year old son Harada tightly as the winged demons from sky surrounded them. The two of them had been caught out in the open as she was walking him to the neighborhood school when the monsters descended. She had spent the last hour running and hiding while the police and the JSDF tried desperately to fend off the invaders.

Without anywhere else to run, and completely worn out from her desperate efforts to protect her child, she was convinced that this was the end for her, convinced that her desperate cry to Amaterasu and the other kami for salvation would go unanswered. Closing her eyes as the three of the winged demons descended on her and her child, like they had for so many other innocent people, she prepared for the worst. Luckily the worst didn't come.

There was a loud bang like a gunshot had gone off, followed by series of loud and meaty impact sounds, and then distant crashes. Bringing herself to open her eyes, Yukio was surprised to find a foreigner standing in front of her. He was young, early twenties and incredibly handsome, with spiky blonde hair that had splotch of white just above his forehead, sapphire blue eyes and a trio of whisker-like marks on each cheek.

He was just standing their with a kind smile, waiting patiently for her to address him. With what little English she could remember she asked. "W-who are you?"

It was butchered and came out sounding more like 'Hooru aru yoo?' but the foreigner seemed to understand seeing as he replied in perfect Japanese. "My name is Uzumaki Naruto, I'm here to help!"

"You speak Japanese?" Yukio asked, startled by his name and perfect accent.

To her surprise he shook his head negatively and replied. "Your language is as foreign to me as any other, but so far every language on Earth I have come across, whether spoken or written, I have simply understood. The how or why I understand languages is unimportant, I just do. You are speaking Japanese, but to me it sounds like Elemental, and I am speaking Elemental but it sounds like Japanese to you. That is all there is to it."

"Huh, are you a god?" She asked while cocking her head sideways in clear curiosity. Surely there was no language on Earth called Elemental, and the ability he had described did sound like something one would expect of a god.

"I am similar but different. More importantly, I am willing to step in and save you from these invading devils on their behalf. That is if you and your son are willing to take my hand and trust me." The foreigner replied, offering his open hands to them to grab on. Hands that were glowing with golden flames.

Giving one last glance to her son, Yukio decided to take a leap of faith and closed her eyes while reaching for the foreigner's hand. She was surprised when instead being burnt by the golden flames, she felt herself be enveloped in what she could only describe as power. She felt more alive in that instant than she had ever felt in her entire life, and all the aches and pains in her back from an old car accident were instantly gone.

Opening her eyes, Yukio was surprised to find herself wrapped in a field of dark orange energy shaped like a fox. Besides her, her son was also wrapped in the same field of energy, having accepted the god's hand while she was caught up in the euphoric feel of power coursing through her body. This man had not deigned to give out his name, but he had to be Inari or a follower of the fox god. The golden flame, the fox shaped energy and those whisker marks couldn't possibly be a coincidence right.

Getting her wits about her, she asked. "So what happens now?"

"Now, I send you somewhere safe, where other clones of me will give you further instruction." He said

with a foxy grin that made her blush, before she and her son where enveloped in golden light and instantly transported elsewhere.

VvV

**Geilenkirchen, Germany...**

Nato personnel backed by the full might of the German military where running back and forth trying to organize the hundreds of people appearing from thin air, every seconds, by the seconds. Already a substantial population well into the hundreds of thousands were in makeshift tents provided for them by the German military. All of them had been plucked from Berlin and nearby towns, before being quite literally teleported to a field right next to the Nato Air Base.

The German military had surrounded them with entire convoys of tanks, IFV's and APC, while fleets of Gunships, Combat drones and other military planes circled the sky above to shoot down anything that wasn't human. The whole country, was at red alert, every country was at red alert. The whole world was currently under attack, and the only ones who really seemed to know what was going on were those vigilante's from America, particularly the Batman who had somehow called the German Chancellor on his personal phone with a solution. A solution that involved the relocation of a massive amount of citizens from the capital to safe zones, via teleportation of all things.

To say that this left General Wulfgang von Leonhard at a loss of what to even think was an understatement. No one really knew what to think of the alien invaders or of the vigilante's who were pulling what could only be described as acts of god, particularly that blonde one with the spiky hair that was running around the camp helping set things up. But one thing was plain to see, these vigilante's...no, these heroes where here to help, and as long as they were protecting German citizens, the German Chancellor was happy to let them, which in turn meant the General was happy to let them.

Taking a deep draw on his cup of 1859 malt whiskey, a gift from one of his fellow general's when he got his first star a few years ago, General Leonhard polished off the remnants of his drink and headed out into the field. He had work to do and his country's citizens needed protecting.

VvV

**Unknown location, Washington, D.C...**

"I don't understand. Which one is this guy again?" The President asked as he studied the footage of the man with spiky blond hair, decked out in black ordinary clothing instead of a skin tight super-suit. The blond was in the midst of slaughtering over three dozen of the invading monsters with just his bare hands to protect a group of school kids downtown. Monsters that had armor tough enough to ignore small arms fire from cops and the strength to rip through steel girders and reinforced concrete like tissue paper. The blond was making the task look easy too.

Besides the President the head of his Secret Service detail, an agent named Robbie Lucas replied. "He's an unknown sir! But Batman is using him or his copies to move hundreds of thousands, possibly millions of civilians to his proposed safe zones. That man sir, is everywhere."

"I sense you don't like him Robbie, even though he is out their saving American lives?" The President asked with a raised eyebrow, knowing exactly what Robbie was thinking. The agent having joined the now President's detail years ago when he first became a senator.

"No I don't sir! And not just him, all of their kind. How am I supposed to do my job and protect you and your family in a world where people can fly fly and rip monsters to pieces with their bare hands. This guy can somehow create copies of himself, and right now many of those copies are scattered all over the world, executing Batman's orders. Not yours, Batman's? The same Batman who just hacked the world, and more importantly America's civilian and military network, cause he could!" Robbie finished, his explanation turning it into a slight rant, which was a tad bit biased but the President didn't mind. He had specifically asked for this.

"I see you feel quite strongly about this." The President said with a thoughtful expression of his own. It was an understatement, they had this conversation every other day, though Robbie had never expressed himself as much on the matter as he had today.

"Yes, Julian I do!" Robbie said in a friendlier tone, using the President's given name, a right Robbie had earned long ago after taking a bullet for him back when he was just a Senator. "My life's mission is to ensure you get a chance to fulfill your life's mission. But I can't fight what I can't see coming, I can't kill someone endangering you who just so happens to be invulnerable, and I can't stop a person that can simply teleport you away in an instant."

"A little dramatic there but okay. And speaking of teleportation, I want to hear your opinion on Batman's plan? He went to dangerous lengths to get our attention." The US President asked.

"Near as we can tell, its exactly what Batman said it would be, in his transmission. The relocation of people around the world to his proposed safe zones, where they can be protected by their native countries military's Mr. President! He also forwarded a list of observations he had made and strategy's that had worked for him and his team." Robbie said, a little sourness in his tone. Julian's Lead agent, no doubt secretly wished he could empty a clip in Batman's face for the headache the vigilante and his kind had created for the Secret Service. Now the USSS would need to create brand new countermeasures to deal with the super-powered individuals threatening the past, present and future leaders of the nation and their families.

"I see, and this young man is the key to Batman's whole strategy right." The President stated more than asked, his eyes refocusing on the screen with the young and unmasked vigilante. A plan already going through his mind on how to spin this into a political win for his reelection. That footage would leak in the aftermath of this crisis once they repelled the invaders and these vigilante's would be no doubt be seen as heroes. As President of the United States and leader of the free world, he would need to get ahead of this quickly.

Sensing a change the President's disposition, Agent Robbie Lucas asked. "Do your orders still stand to have Batman arrested for simultaneously hacking our Satellite's, Sir?"

The President shook his head in response, and thought to himself. _'Robbie and many others will not like this.'_ In a tone that made it clear that it was an order, the President finally said. "I'll rescind that order."

"Mr. President?" Robbie asked, addressing him formally to show his old friend that he would respect and follow any orders given to the letter, but as a friend and trusted confidant wanted an explanation.

Sighing deeply the President said. "Ensuring that whatever kind of technology Batman used to hack the world doesn't fall into our enemy's hands is imperative. But this new guy is transporting the populations of entire cities through space and time to Batman's Safe zones. Someone that powerful is following Batman, along side The Superman, The Flash and who knows how many more of these super beings Batman has with him. If they pull this off, if we somehow repel this invasion, then they will be seen by the whole World as heroes, and I will not be seen as the American President who persecuted its own heroes. Besides, we can always bring Batman in later, when the whole world isn't watching and he doesn't have as much public support."

Mollified with the explanation Robbie replied. "Yes Sir, Mr. President!"

There was trio of loud knocks followed by five more in an alternating rhythm before the President got up from his work station and said. "Well then agent Lucas. Its time to meet our new hero and get my family and our entourage extracted to Cheyenne, Colorado via teleportation. NORAD has intel for me to make a decision on."

"You're enjoying this aren't you." Robbie growled before rising to meet the teleporting blond Batman had sent for the President and his family. Had it been up to Robbie Lucas and the United States Secret Service, this meeting would never have happened but it wasn't. The Whitehouse was surrounded by the invaders and there was no other quick way to extract the President and his family. It was President Julian Anderson who made the decision to take up Batman's offer of extraction, so the Secret Service just had to grit their teeth and bare with it.

VvV

A corona of brilliant energy surrounded Naruto Uzumaki in the form a golden flame, while he hovered above the ground legs crossed in the lotus position. He had been channeling power for mere minutes, but across the world the reports where the same, millions of people where being teleported by his clones to Batman's designated safe zones with each second. Most of the major cities on the planet were being emptied of their entire human population at a mind-boggling speed, and it was putting a clearly tremendous strain on Naruto.

His nose had been the first to start bleeding from the strain as he pushed every ounce of chakra he could into his connection with his clones, something he had learned to do during the war. It was swiftly followed by his ears and eyes, as every vein in his body seemed to bulge in grotesque fashion, yet he did not break his concentration for even a second. Then he coughed up a mouth full of blood, but instead of quitting like the other heroes insisted after taking notice, he gave one last push with everything he had, before his chakra aura flickered out and he fell to the floor.

Hitting the ground on his hands and knees gasping hard for breath before hacking out some more blood. Sweat dripped from his forehead in fast flowing trickles, while his whole body shook with exhaustion. The blood that had been leaking from his nose, eyes, mouth and ears quickly began steaming before evaporating seconds later. His body was automatically pushing everything he had left into healing himself of the physical damages he had caused to it.

Naruto had always had good regeneration due to his Uzumaki heritage and Kurama's chakra, but Tsunade had helped push his regeneration to knew heights during the 6 months of the 4th Shinobi World War. Teaching him how to direct that regeneration with slight amounts of chakra to speed up or prioritize specific areas, or even how to slow it down in case he needed to for some reason. She'd also taught him the basics of medical ninjutsu, nothing complex, but enough to diagnose a patient with his chakra, as well as knowledge about human anatomy. His Six Paths healing ability, filling in the rest of the gaps.

The sheer amount of knowledge and training he had received from Tsunade, significantly speeding up and heightening his regeneration to a point that it was easily comparable to that of the First Hokage, Hashirama Senju. Making him in turn extremely difficult to kill.

Even so, the strain of channeling enough sage chakra to power over ten thousand clones across world and then have them transfer over four hundred million people to the safe zones. To say it was a tremendous burden, was an understatement, the task had come closer than anything since his battle with Kaguya to killing him, leaving Naruto almost perilously low on chakra. And the damage, wasn't just to his physical body either.

His chakra reserves felt as if they were near empty at this point, but that wasn't a problem, they would refill to safe levels in few minutes, it was his chakra pathways that worried him. Quite frankly they felt like they had been deep fried and knocked out of commission from the sheer amount of energy he had been channeling and the speed at which he had been using it. All but the smallest trickle of chakra through his pathways hurt.

Right now he couldn't perform another jutsu if his life depended on it, and his pathway's would need time to heal, possibly up to between 30-45 minutes. Time in which he could not replenish his clones or teleport anyone in danger to safety. And as if that wasn't bad enough, at the moment, Naruto felt as weak as ramen noodles both physically and mentally. If he tried to fight a Parademon then he would definitely lose in his current state. Thankfully his clones were still around and he was in safe company.

A hand appeared before his face and Naruto looked up to see who was offering to find Superman, much to his surprise. When he wasn't acting as bait for one of Batman's plans, the Man of Steel's job had been protecting the Metropolis Safe Zone, a football stadium and its surrounding facility's, in the New Troy district. It was packed to the brim with people, 11 million people to be exact.

It had taken the combined efforts of the Flash and hundreds of Naruto's clones, to get food, water, medication and any other supplies that were deemed necessary to just about everyone in the safe zone. But even with sealing scrolls making the job considerably easier, moving the supplies and gathering all those people to the Safe Zone had been hard work.

Grabbing the offered hand, Naruto was pulled to his feet, which he stood on shakily at first before getting his balance under control. A bottle of water was handed to him by Green Lantern which he gulped down almost desperately, followed by a towel to wipe away the sweat by Flash. The kindness his new teammates were showing him surprised him a bit. It was a 180 degree turn from the wariness and sometimes blatant mistrust he had been shown earlier that evening when he first used the Rasenshuriken.

"Thank you!" Naruto humbly said, but Superman shook his head as if to say his thanks were unnecessary.

"We've been unfair to you Sage, well me and Flash that is. You didn't identify yourself as Superhero but rather a warrior so we've all been keeping you at arms length in our own ways. And then their was that Rasenshuriken technique you used. Well, for someone like me who can see all those energy blades at the microscopic level..." Superman explained.

Flash immediately picked up where Superman ended. "And someone like me who watched it all unfold, _slowly._ It's a horrifically terrifying application of your power, and so we judged you without even really considering that you might have had a good reason for creating something like that. I looked at you with the same suspicions as I would a potential villain."

Lowering his head slightly Superman said. "What we are trying to say is that, we are sorry. Watching you struggle to channel all that power, desperately working to save as many people as you can. It drove home the fact that you are just as much a hero as any of us, perhaps even more, and we had no right to judge you, especially when we don't know anything about you. Please forgive us Sage?"

"There is nothing to forgive guys. I don't think that you were wrong to be wary of me, in fact due to how I grew up its expected, comforting even, in its familiarity. I am ninja, I was raised in a world of violence, where you did not trust anyone save those from your own village, that's what I was taught from an early age. I wasn't ever very good at that though." Naruto said with with self-depreciating chuckle, before turning to them and saying. "I never needed you to like me or fully trust me, only to trust me enough to be able to do my part and watch your backs, just as I trust you to watch mine. And you've already done this for me, it's more than enough."

"Its not right! Green Lantern is my friend, but I only met Superman and Batman tonight. I was willing to trust and cooperate with them as soon as I met them, but as soon as I saw the effects of your Rasenshuriken. I treated you as if you were not one of us, just someone we needed in the meantime. I treated you like something to be used and discarded. You're a part of this team and its not right." Flash insisted.

Sighing, Naruto said with a chuckle. "The irony of this situation is that, that is exactly how a ninja is supposed to be treated. But then again, that was the old way of doing things and we've outlived those archaic ways." Looking up to Flash and Superman he said. "You two really are one of a kind, your conscious' wont even let you fight a war without settling your inner feelings. Fine, I forgive you, but really its unnecessary. It would be a different story if you were completely unwilling to cooperate with me and people died cause of it, but not once did you object to my ideas or refuse to back me up. For me such actions showed me enough about you guys, for me to want to work with you, to even proud of it."

Superman held out his hand to shake it as he said. "Thank you Sage! This fight isn't over, but I can definitely say that its been an honor working with you so far!"

Taking the hand and shaking first Superman's hand and then the Flash, Naruto replied. "Agreed!"

"Jeez, you guys! Let's save the congratulating each other for after we win." Green Lantern interjected, having remained uncharacteristically silent for the last few minutes.

Batman who was naturally a silent type added. "Lantern's right! We are a long way from being done here. The Safe Zones are keeping millions safer than the cities could, but my Satellite's are picking up a large number of the monsters headed our way."

"Yeah, about that! I got us some back up." Naruto grinned while scratching the back of his head.

Narrowing his eyes Batman asked. "What do you mean back up?"

"I made a friend while we were busy taking out the Parademons earlier." Naruto explained, hoping they would ignore the fact that he was only just bringing this up now. He didn't really want to explain, let alone justify his clones being able to act independently from him, or that only after they dispelled did he absorb their returning memories and knowledge. Otherwise, he had no clue what some of his clones were doing.

"Parademons?" Superman asked, sounding fascinated with the word.

Naruto pointed at few dead Parademons that had been stacked on the side of the road by a couple of clones and said. "Apparently that's the name my friend uses to refer to these invaders. This isn't the first time they've attacked the planet Earth either."

"And how do you know this is accurate or that this friend of yours is telling the truth." Batman asked, it was less from caution and skepticism than a desire to have all the relevant information so he could make new plans for the future involving Diana. He was really good at planning like that.

"Simple enough, one of my powers allows me to sense good and evil in a living being, to a certain degree. Trust me, she is not evil or I wouldn't bring her up." Naruto chuckled at their incredulous looks as he revealed another power before saying. "Look, I know its a lot to take on faith, but she is a good person. Like us, she just wants to help humanity, and she's a damn good fighter, something we will need cause I wont be able to perform ninja technique's for a bit, I'm still healing internally. She was capable of defeating one of my clones in one on one combat, twelve times in a row, a clone that was not holding back at all. We need her."

Batman eyed him for a moment clearly deliberating his next move before he asked. "Do you trust her?"

Naruto didn't hesitate to nod before replying. "About as much as I trust you guys. So yes."

"Then call her, I presume you have some prearranged signal." Batman stated more than asked, ignoring Green Lantern's protest in the background about him not getting a chance to give an opinion on the matter.

"Yes, though one more thing. Me and her are already pretty familiar with each others fighting styles so its probably better she fights along side me when you deploy us Batman. Also she is very much a warrior so please try to keep that in mind as you address her, and make her feel welcome." Naruto replied before giving a shrill whistle signaling for Diana to come out from the shadows. A moment later there was crash from the impact of something landing on the ground hard enough to crater it.

As the dust cleared Princess Diana of Themyscira rose from it in all her beauty and grace. She had been watching them from a Skyscraper 2 miles away, like Naruto's clone had instructed before it dispelled itself, and was clearly delighted to finally take part in the action.

"Welcome to our little group, Diana." Naruto greeted Diana as she walked up to him, the others all had their eyes on the new girl and where clearly wondering how well he knew her. Even in his current weakened state, Naruto could still sense a bit of lust and jealously radiating from some of them through his empathy, mostly Green Lantern and surprisingly Superman. Smirking Naruto introduced her saying. "Guys, allow me to introduce you to Diana of Themyscira, Princess of the Amazons, and the most skilled fighter I've yet come across on Earth. She is a fierce warrior willing to aide us in protecting the innocent and saving the world."

"A princess? Here?" Green Lantern asked, shocked by this fact.

"Don't just assume that she's like one of those useless Disney Princess's in the media. Trust me when I tell you that she as good as me at fighting and we've all seen what I can do?" Naruto said with a frown. While it was true that most princesses didn't fight, even in the Elemental Nations. The stereotype that Princesses and royalty were weak because they were royalty and lived a soft life did not really exist in the Elemental Nations. Over there, a princess not fighting was simply by choice, rather than because they were incapable doing so due to their lifestyle.

It made Naruto wonder what the hell kind of Princesses Earth had for a story like "The Princess and the Pea" to pop up or "Sleeping Beauty". Not to mention he had literally just told Green Lantern a minute ago that she was a warrior and that they should make her feel welcome, going as far as to stress the warrior bit. The temptation to punch the green buffoon was suddenly very great.

"Even so, if something happens to her, her home nation will hold us responsible." Flash interjected.

"You don't have to worry about Themyscira. We are Amazon's, war is in our blood. Should I fall in battle, I will be honored by my sisters and you will not be held responsible." Diana simply offered.

"Okay! Now that we got that cleared up, Diana, perhaps you can tell them what you told my clone." Naruto said, forcing a change in the topic so as to rush things along before he punched one of his teammates.

"I don't know as much about them as I would like. My mother, Queen Hippolyta tried to shelter me from such dark knowledge for most of my life. However what I do know is that, these invaders have been to this world before, thousands of years ago at the dawn of human civilization." Diana explained.

"Naruto mentioned a little about that, but I'd like to here the details from you." Batman said very focused on Diana now.

"These Parademons are merely mindless soldiers that follow the will of their god and ruler, and make no mistake about this, their ruler is a real god. He is known as Darkseid, the God of Evil, the tyrannical ruler of Apokolips, a world that sits beyond the boundaries of the universe itself, also home to the New gods. They are a species of deity's that differ from the gods of Earth in some way currently unknown to me. Most of what I know about the New Gods and Darkseid is merely knowledge passed down from the older Amazons who personally fought his agents thousands of years ago, I didn't yet exist back then." She confessed, looking a little ashamed that she knew so little. Naruto gave her an encouraging smile that made her smile back at him.

However, her words caused no small amount of shock for some of the heroes, especially when they realized the meaning behind them. Flash was the first to deduce what she had said and asked. "Wait, are you saying that your people live for thousands of years?"

Diana merely nodded as if it was no big deal as she replied. "I myself have lived for over thousand of your years, according to your calendar. Yet, I am a mere child in comparison to mother and the other Amazons. I don't know how long they have lived, but they have been around long enough to remember what Darkseid did to this world the last time he graced it with his presence."

"What did he do?" Superman asked warily.

Diana frowned as she continued her story, saying. "You have to understand something first. Back then, all mankind had for weapons were spears and arrows. Useless against a normal god, even less than useless against a god using divine technology, beyond the understanding of mortals. In short humanity had no chance of winning that war."

"But seeing as we are still here, then the war must have been won right?" Green Lantern asked to which Diana once again nodded.

"The gods of Earth rose up in the end to defend the planet alongside their creations. The gods and their creations, the monsters from myth and mankind, all fought with one unified goal to protect the Earth. They barely held the line against Darkseid and his invasion force. From how my mother told it, the one time she was willing to indulge my curiosity, these Parademons are but a fraction of the armies Apokolips fielded back then." Diana said,looking around at the destruction and damage caused by the Parademons to Metropolis, and no doubt aware that the rest of the world had suffered similar damage. "Apokolips is also home to one full half of the race of New Gods, the other half residing on a rival planet called New Genesis, who are basically the good New Gods in opposition to Darkseid's evil New Gods. It was these New Gods who actually drove Darkseid and his armies back to Apokolips."

"He couldn't fight a war on two fronts." Batman accurately concluded.

"Exactly. We had enough gods and monsters to keep his forces in check, but only barely, and the cost of doing so was immense for Earth. Many gods died that day, and while gods can reform after dying a physical death, it takes time, time that can be considerably extended when no one is around to worship you any more. It said that only a handful of the most famous of gods and their respective pantheons are even remembered in this day and age, as a result, only they have returned from death to walk amongst us once more. I'm sure they are less than pleased to find that they've been reduced to mere myths and folk stories." Diana finished with a snort. Humanity was well known for having a short memory when it came to stuff like that.

"You speak as if you know the gods, personally I mean." Batman stated his observation.

"The Greek gods are the protectors of Themyscira, and they are the ones that granted me my powers." Diana said as if it was just another every day thing to talk about gods.

VvV

Floating in space above the Earth, hidden from the eyes of all beings in this multiverse, a true being that transcended all existence, quietly hovered. This being had its gaze set firmly on the blue marble of a planet that was humanity's home, watching steadily as the armies of Apokolips invaded Earth and reaped a toll in human life. Yet it was no near as much loss as the being had initially expected thanks to the efforts on one truly admirable young man.

The being would've liked to watch the transpiring events for a little longer, but it seemed everything was coming to head. The climax of this story's arc was just beginning and despite the beings Omniscience, the being had blinded themselves to this timelines future so as to better enjoy it as it unfolded. With a small but genial smile the being said.

"**Looks like its time for the action to really kick off. Its time for you to prove to me that you were worth the time and investment I put into saving your life. Show me the future I glimpsed when I found your half dead body floating around the empty abyss, bring it forth so I may be in awe of you mortals once more. Show me what kind of hero you are Naruto Uzumaki, and in doing so show the whole world what you are worth my dear little godslayer."**

VvV

**Metropolis Harbor, Metropolis...**

Their was a thunderous crack, as the very earth shook and the waters raged as if Poseidon himself had decided to unleash his wrath. A pillar of pure energy shot into the sky, as the ocean water caught fire in the distance and swirled lazily in a mockery of Naruto's family name. When the energy finally dissipated it revealed a massive tower rising out of the sea.

A single glance at it was enough to tell anyone that the tower was not of human design. In some ways it appeared almost organic, rounded and smoothed. In other ways it had odd angles, was jagged, scaly and twisted. Nevertheless, even from a distance Naruto could feel the tower radiating malice and cruelty through his empathy powers. It was all he could do not to fire a Tailed Beast Ball at the nearest one, and indeed, there was more than one of the damn things. Well, he really couldn't even if he wanted to cause his chakra pathways were still messed up, but it was the thought that counts.

"What is that?" Flash asked bewildered by the gigantic tower. He had been the first to get to the docks area with his super-speed, followed by Superman, Naruto, Wonder Woman, Green Lantern and then Batman.

Instead of answering him, Naruto focused his attention on the water. He'd almost missed it with the sudden appearance of the tower. Two individuals in the water, one nearby another further down, killing Parademons if the negative emotions and dark life-signs winking out were anything to go by.

There was a thud, as the body of a Parademon landed on the boardwalk in front of them, a seven pointed trident skewering it like a giant kebab. And crouching behind the monster was a dripping wet blond man in green and golden scaled armor, with a jeweled necklace around his neck. A man the public had taken to calling Aquaman.

"I was hoping you lot could tell me." He spoke in a rich charismatic voice, as he yanked his trident out of the back of the Parademon, before adding. "These demons are in the water too."

"I take that that's your friend, in water busy annihilating the other Parademons." Naruto asked, nodding his head towards the water to show exactly who he meant, an action that earned him a bit of surprise from Aquaman, and frown. Aquaman didn't get the chance to reply though.

"Not friend, royal subject!" A woman said bursting out of the water like a jet seconds later, to land on the docks. In a word, she was beautiful. She had rich red hair that somehow managed to look both wet and dry at the same time, and would've marked her as an Uzumaki in the Elemental Nations, blue almost aqua colored eyes that seemed to glow with hidden emotions and a heart shaped face with high cheek bones and light pink colored lips.

She was clothed in a form hugging full body suit made of countless green interlocking scales resembling those of a fish and lined with gold. The outfit had a low v-neck that hinted at an impressive amount of cleavage, yet hugged her curvaceous figure in a way that any man could deeply appreciate. The sleeves of the outfit were missing, showing her muscular arms, save for the Jade arm guards covering each of her forearm. Around her waist she wore a belt with numerous little sections, like small pouches, while its buckle was made of gold and in the shape of a letter A.

The woman's words seemed to have a negative effect on Aquaman, as Naruto felt his emotions instantly plummet, but the blond water-man quickly rallied himself again, and arrogantly asked. "Who is in charge of this group? I vote me."

Scowling as his fellow blond, Naruto replied. "We already got a leader, and he is currently dressed like a giant black bat. You want to lead, you better prove you are better than him, and more importantly worth following." Naruto finished by thumbing at Batman who merely frowned but said nothing.

A giant emerald X materialized in the air between the heroes followed by a loud buzzer sound going off, as Green Lantern interjected saying. "No! Back up people! I am not about take orders from just anybody! Who the hell are you two anyway?"

"They call him Aquaman. The Lady is an unknown, though she has been seen in his company on occasion." The answer came from Batman, and it startled everyone save Naruto who was already aware Aquaman's existence thanks Madame Xanadu.

"Aquaman is real?" Green Lantern asked in disbelief, looking like the world no longer made any sense to him.

"I'm standing right here!" Said Atlantian spoke up, fed up of everyone talking about him as if he wasn't present.

It didn't help one bit seeing as Green Lantern continued to ignore him and and muttered to himself. "First Batman is real, now Aquaman is real."

"Be polite Lantern." Flash said in a low voice, after elbowing his friend in the ribs much to Green Lantern's annoyance.

Diana however was delighted by the news, smiling at the newcomers as she joyfully proclaimed. "Greetings Atlantians! Quite a day for a fight is it not?"

In response, Aquaman frowned at the greeting and asked. "How do you even know that I am Atlantian?"

"I am Diana of Themyscira." She promptly replied making Aquaman's partner smile and step forward to talk to her fellow female. Clearly she was not too interested in talking to the men.

"An Amazon! Here! I thought your people no longer involved themselves in the affairs of mankind." The woman said, finally interested enough to engage in the conversation.

Diana happily replied. "I could say the same about your people, but here you are."

Nodding in acknowledgment of her point, the redhead said. "Indeed, Diana of Themyscira. However, I am not of Atlantis, I am Mera off Xebel, another city state of the Old Atlantian Empire, and currently a rival kingdom to Atlantis. Technically they rule us, but we are our own thing."

Aquaman who had seemed so confident and arrogant since his arrival seemed to once again deflate at those words, and Naruto sensed a deep sadness and regret coming from him. But it was only for a moment, before he composed himself and lightly nudged the Parademon he had killed with his foot while saying. "This Demon I killed was in my ocean, it set of a device that tore open a hole in the water and more of its kind flew out. You're obviously gathered together to fight them."

"I suppose we have." Flash replied after looking around giving everyone gathered a once over.

Nodding his head, once he confirmed that everyone present was ready to fight, Aquaman said. "Then the question is what do we do next?"

"Any thoughts, oh noble leader?" Naruto teasingly offered Batman. He had been quite for a lot of the conversation much like Superman and Batman, and now felt the need to speak up.

"Those towers appeared for a reason and the Parademons are circling them as if assembling. Let's find out their purpose? We need to get inside one and figure out what they are for, how they work, why they are here and how to break them." Turning to Naruto, Batman asked him. "Do you think your clones can blow them up with your Rasenshuriken attack if worst comes to worst. You said they can do the same things you can do, so even if you are still healing, they should be fine right?"

"Yeah, my can blow it up, not sure if a Rasenshuriken will cut it though, that tower is huge. Don't worry I got something more explosive in mind for the job, just leave it to me...err, them." Naruto quickly corrected himself with a small smile. He was going to say more but was suddenly interrupted by a now familiar and rather unwelcome sound.

**BOOOOOOM!**

Naruto and everyone startled as a new portal opened right in front of them and from it appeared a young black man in his late teens or early 20's covered in silver-white armor. Correction, it looked like the armor was grafted to his very body. It didn't look like the process was pleasant either. Naruto cursed himself for not being able to seal the portal, due to his chakra pathways being messed. Then again, it proved to be unnecessary when he looked at the new guy's emotions.

The young man stumbled to his knees as the portal closed behind him, and then all hell broke loose. Diana drew her sword, Mera created a vicious looking spear of solid water to skewer him with and Aquaman aimed his trident at the newcomer. In the same amount of time Green Lantern created a giant hand which moved to clamp around the young man and more than likely crush him, while Superman, Flash and even Batman subtly prepared for combat. Naruto had no intention of let that happen however.

In a burst of speed that left little more than an afterimage, Naruto moved forward to intercept Green Lantern's attack. And with a single punch, Green Lantern's giant hand construct shattered it into thousands of emerald pieces that quickly faded into nothing. Naruto felt rather impressed by his bodies physical capabilities, despite not being able to use his chakra.

Startled by this, Green Lantern yelled. "Hey, what the big idea? I had this one."

"Use your eyes you fool. He is not a Parademon, he's just a scared kid." Naruto responded, making everyone take a second look at the young man. The fact that he had arrived via the same portal as the Parademons had put everyone on edge, that he mostly did not look human, had not helped. However Naruto could sense his emotions and knew that neither he nor his armor were seeped in the same evil taint as the Parademons. This guy was obviously something else, and the others must have recognized this too, seeing as one by one they all started to put away their weapons.

"Sage, how can you be sure he is not an agent of the enemy?" Being thorough as always, Batman asked him. It surprised Naruto to find through his empathy powers, that Batman was completely trusting him with this decision.

"As you remember, I reacted negatively to the Parademons when they first appeared. That's because I can feel their darkness. To me their hate, cruelty and evil are something almost tangible, something almost infectious, so my powers activated automatically to shield me. This guy has none of that, he is just a kid that's scared out of his mind, with regular human emotions but still trying to do the right thing. Also, if he is here then he like all of us came here for a reason." Naruto assured Batman and felt relieved when Batman accepted his word.

"You don't think its coincidence that he's here." It was a statement from Batman rather than a question, and it was true. Them all gathering here wasn't an accident but destiny or some other higher power. He would know, he wasn't from this dimension after all and had been a child of prophecy in his native dimension where he completed said prophecy and brought peace to the world at the cost of everything he cared for.

He should have died but was brought here to another world in a time of crisis, desperately needing heroes to save it, and had leaped right into the fray without a second thought. Their was no way it was a coincidence that he of all people was here, let alone with the six most popular vigilante's in all of America, and two new guys. Nine of the worlds most powerful beings in one place, no, no matter how you looked at it, this couldn't be coincidence. Naruto smiled as he responded. "I don't think its a coincidence any of us are here, and neither do you Batman. That said, it would be nice to know your name my armored friend?"

Offering a hand to the metal clad man who reminded him of the puppets of Sunagakure except metal, the man hesitated for a half a second before allowing himself to be pulled to his feet as he said. "I'm Victor Stone...and I've talked to their technology. I know their plan."

Naruto smirked and yelled. "See I told you it wasn't coincidence!"

"Not now Sage." Batman chastised before focusing on Victor and saying. "Mr. Stone, we need that intel. Billions of lives might be depending on it."

"Yes, of course Batman Sir." Victor stumbled nervously before clearing his throat and saying. "They go from world to world, harvesting the population." As he said this a holographic image was projected from a red eye like visor in the middle of his forehead. It depicted swarms of Parademons attacking other worlds and carrying off their residents.

"For what purpose?" Batman asked.

"To-" Victor paused mid-sentence as he received a new signal. His holo-projection shorted out of existence a second later, and their was an extremely loud Ping from every Motherbox in the city at the same time. As one all of the the giant towers spiked in their energy output, and Victor looked at the one out in the sea with horrified expression as he said. "Oh no, its too soon! We are too late! He's here!"

"Who's here?" Superman asked with a great deal of concern in his voice, to which Victor Stone merely pointed towards tower in the middle of the sea, making the group as one turn to it. But it was Naruto who gave them all their answer as a massive portal tore open the sky and tens of thousands more Parademons flew out, along with a humanoid figure that looked very different from the Parademons and was clearly their leader.

"What we've all been dreading since this battle began." Naruto said in a tone that was unnaturally calm and did not at all match the icy feeling of dread he felt inside.

"**I am Entropy! I am Death! I am...Darkseid!"**

TBC...

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I really hope you enjoyed the second chapter of Sage of War. This chapter fought me all the way and I ended up writing 28 pages instead of 18, but I am happy to do it for you guys. Now that i am used to my schedule i hope to be able to pump the next chapter faster. Next time the League try their luck with Darkseid and Naruto has a little meet & greet with his mysterious savior. Please leave a review and tell me what you think.

Scarlet Out!


	3. Chapter 3: Divided we Fall!

Pairing: Naruto/Supergirl/Wonder-Woman/Grail/Mera/Shay Veritas/Zatanna/Poison Ivy/Donna Troy/?

Disclaimer: I do not own the Naruto franchise or DC comics. I simply do this for fun and to improve myself as writer.

**A/N:** First of all, I just want to say thank you for the amazing response you guys have given this story. You are the best. I am just floored by how much you all like it. Secondly, I am really sorry for the delays, I know in my new story "Born of Fire", I said I would update on Sunday or Monday and its technically Wednesday early morning here. But more power outages and the internet going do, kept me from keeping that promise. By the way, if you haven't read it, please check out Born of Fire and leave a review there. Anyway, I am kind of rushing this because those same internet and power issues, so the chapter may feel a little off in some places.

I have to write when I can as quickly as I can because the power gets cut all the time, and my laptop does not have a battery.

My first draft of this chapter had everything going far too smoothly for the heroes, so I through it out. The whole Justice League team was working too well together and considering that these guys had just met each other, it seemed unnatural. They seemed like they had been working together as team for years instead of mere hours, so I had to change it.

Now, any mistakes made, or impulsive actions seem more like things that would occur with a rookie team. They are all still learning to work together, and it greatly affects their performance against Darkseid who I tried to make a real threat. Not really unstoppable but the kind of threat that requires the whole Justice League team to deal with, and some very unconventional ninja tricks.

Because of time I am just going to reply to a few reviews.

**bigfan22:** I am fairly sure Darkseid will both hate and admire Naruto by the end, but between then and now, there will be much fighting and smiting to be done.

**NarutoxYugao:** Firstly, I love that pairing. Secondly Mera is quite yet versed in the magical arts, its something she will be working towards through the rest of the story.

**Astroman1000:** Sorry if he seems too weird, but the whole basis behind this Naruto is that 4th Shinobi World War went on for 6 months longer. I can't imagine Naruto not maturing in that time period, especially if he and Sasuke were the only thing standing between Madara and the world ending.

**nitewolf423:** There is a learning curve to learning how to use strange new powers, and Darkseid is really powerful. So no, Naruto will not be killing him. He will still make Darkseid wish he hadn't come to Earth...eventually.

**C:** I wouldn't call it a romantic moment, but he does give her a bit of a pep talk near the end of the chapter when she is feeling a little low.

**andytak3740:** Sorry, I am working on that.

**Banjo the Fox:** Naruto is very connected to both life and death. Killing isn't the first option he will resort to, he sees needless loss of life as a waste. That said, he will do what he must to protect the innocent and killing certain villains is an option that is very much on the table with him.

Okay that is enough reviews, lets get on with the story. I really hope you enjoy it and please remember to leave a review at the end.

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Chapter 3: Divided we fall!

"_You all thought you knew him! That golden god you celebrated, who loved you mortals enough to lay his own well life down to protect you. Pretending he cared one iota about what happened to you, as he healed your sick, fed your hungry and protected your helpless in the name of Justice. Never even once wondering that maybe, just maybe, there was something fundamentally wrong with him. You thought that because he saved you, day after day, that you understood him. _

_Human Arrogance, you don't even understand yourselves, how could you possibly believe yourselves capable of understanding a fundamental force of nature. He is a being born of violence, to live for the sake violence. His charisma and beliefs were nothing more than his best attempts to delude himself into believing he could do anything in this life, other than bring death and destruction. All it took was for someone to snap him out of his delusions, and your golden god brought your whole world down around you. He was after all, only fulfilling his purpose as humanity's inevitable end."_

— Unknown man in the near future

**oOo**

**Metropolis Harbor, Metropolis...**

**I am Entropy! I am Death! **

**I am...Darkseid!**

Naruto Uzumaki was shaking, it wasn't overtly visible, but he could feel himself shaking at the sheer malevolent presence emitted by the being floating before them. Darkseid had arrived, and he was hovering over the ocean, half a mile in front them with a fleet of thousands Parademons at his back.

In his relatively short but exciting life, Naruto had stood face to face and endured the killing intent of numerous powerful beings without ever so much as flinching. Beings that were capable of everything from leveling countries to ending worlds in seconds. Yet somehow he just knew that Darkseid was something beyond all of his past foes, a god in an altogether higher category than anything he had ever faced before. And quite frankly, it terrified him.

The New God and Lord of Apokolips was not actively flaring his killing intent at anyone, like S-rank Ninja, Tailed Beasts and even Kaguya had done in the past. No, it was merely his sheer overwhelming "presence" that stopped Naruto cold. A "presence" seeped in such evil, malice and cruelty, that it froze Naruto where he stood, making it hard for him to breathe. Darkseid's "presence" and the sheer power Naruto could feel rolling off of him every second, was to understate it, simply astronomical.

From the very beginning – via some supernatural instinct – it was abundantly clear to Naruto Uzumaki, that the inevitable outcome of fighting Darkseid directly, would be his death. The only other time Naruto had ever come close to feeling like he wouldn't walk away from a battle, was while fighting Kaguya on his own. What he currently felt in the presence of Darkseid was easily a thousand times worse. Despite this, Naruto had no intention of backing down from this fight, not when so many lives depended on him and his fellow heroes winning.

Thankfully he wasn't alone in this battle, eight others heroes and warriors had stepped up to face this threat to humanity and the world they called home. Luckily his training as a ninja also meant that Naruto did not have to fight the powerful god directly, in fact, he was sure that his specialization in indirect and unconventional combat gave him a higher chance of survival.

Furthermore, six months of war and some of the harshest training regimens nine different Kage's could beat into him, had changed Naruto greatly. He had largely been weened of his more childish strategy's and ways of thinking, but the spark that had given him a penchant for doing the unexpected and the extremely creative, was something that had instead been nurtured by the Kage.

Madara at the time was the single most powerful being in the world, and Naruto and Sasuke could barely stop him. Just teaching them a myriad of new jutsu and skills was not going to cut it when they went up against the Juubi Jinchuuriki's decades of experience. They needed something far more primal, something deeper and unique to the two teen ninja's, in order to hold their own against their legendary foe. For Naruto it was his creativity, a creativity he intended to bring to this fight as soon as his chakra pathways healed.

Taking a deep breath to calm his frayed nerves before exhaling, Naruto repeated the process 3 more times, slowly bringing himself to a more relaxed state while thinking. _'This is just another fight, all I need to do is be cautious and watch my allies' backs. I am not on my own this time.'_

From what he could feel, his chakra pathways would take a bit more time before he could use them again. A serious disadvantage that was akin to normal civilian trying to fight a trained martial artist with both their hands tied behind their back. Still, it could have been worse. His body had after all been enhanced to the point that even in his normal state, it was like he was in Sage mode. So he would use that, every skill he had picked up during the war to stall Darkseid and hope Superman and Wonder Woman could keep the evil god busy until he was back to full power.

"So, I'm guessing that that's the big bad Robokid was freaking out about." Green Lantern broke the silence, as the assembled heroes watched Darkseid approach, his fleet of Parademons following in perfect formation behind him. It was a truly enormous number of reinforcements that could quickly overrun the city if they weren't handled properly. Naruto hoped that the coming battle would keep them focused on the heroes.

"Lucky guess." Batman replied in the most sarcastic tone he could manage in their depressing situation.

Superman seemed to pick up on the tone, snorting as he folded his arms and confidently said. "He doesn't look so tough!"

But as if in mockery of the Kryptonian's words, a trio of F-35 multirole combat, fighter jets dove from the low hanging clouds gathered above, and descended towards the harbor. They quickly entered the bay with their weapons locked on Darkseid's massive form, and a second later they all unleashed their payload of missiles at the New God before flying past him. The thunderous shockwaves of multiple missiles successfully detonating across the gods face and body soon echoed through the bay.

Unfortunately despite the impressive explosions, the missiles had absolutely no effect on Darkseid or his clothes. Something that went a long way to showing the Superheroes exactly what they were up against. The bank of smoke concealing the gods body from view parted as Darkseid continued flying forward towards the harbor at the same leisurely pace as before, revealing himself to be completely unharmed. Then tragedy followed as his eyes lit up like they were illuminated by some unholy hellish blaze.

Twin beams of brilliant crimson energy shot forth from the dark gods eyes, zigzagging at right angles in a plethora of seemingly random direction, too fast for the un-augmented eye to follow save for the trail they left. The two beams suddenly veered backwards in an unpredictable pattern, and began tracking the three F-35 fighter jets with ridiculous ease. To their credit, the Pilots tried to bank and lose the deadly eye beams tracking them, hoping to break whatever lock they had on their aircraft's. Unfortunately the godly eye lasers that put even Superman's to shame, merely course corrected, twisting and turning before separating and pursuing their targets independently.

Before the pilots could even hope to react, the twin beams of destruction came in at unexpected angles and punched massive holes clean through each of the three fighter jets. A second later, the three military aircraft's blossomed into a trio of thunderous, fiery explosions, leaving their scattered debris to fall into the sea without any survivors. It was over in seconds and not once did Darkseid ever look back over his shoulders as he proceeded to the harbor unimpeded.

"No!" Flash gasped in horror to Naruto's far left, the tragedy of what he had just witnessed getting to him. The others stood, equally horrified but did not vocalize it, however, by the way they clenched their fists and their jaws tightened, their feelings on the matter were clearly visible. Even had that not been the case, Naruto easily picked up their horrified shock and grief through his negative emotion sensing. Meanwhile the ninja in question, couldn't help but clench his own fists hard enough to draw blood. He silently swore upon his nindo, to make sure that the deaths that had occurred during this invasion would not be in vain.

Taking a deep breath to calm himself, Naruto said to his comrades. "Prepare yourselves for combat guys. I won't be able to use my chakra for a little while longer, so don't expect anything fancy from me till I recover. Not that Granite-face over there, looks to be the type to wait until his enemies recover."

Contrary to Naruto's words, Darkseid came to a stop less than 20 ft away from them and just...waited. Not even his Parademons so much as twitched behind him. It should've been a moment that they exploited the hell out of, but Green Lantern got excited or perhaps impatient.

"Well if you are no good to us, then stand back and peep the light show! Green Lantern's got this!" The space cop loudly announced as his ring began to glow a brilliant emerald and he flew off to attack Darkseid. It was colossal mistake.

"No, Lantern wait!" Naruto yelled in a vain attempt to stop his teammate, already knowing it was too late. Naruto found himself ironically praying to whatever god or higher being had brought him to this universe, so that the brash idiot wouldn't die. Somehow, in the short time he had been working with these people, he had come to consider them his friends.

Green Lantern formed a giant green spiked gauntlet and flew straight at Darkseid before slamming it in the New Gods face. The impact shattered the construct, and succeeded in turning Darkseid's head to the right. Naruto actually found himself surprised that Darkseid had even gotten hit by the Lantern, the punch was completely telegraphed and Naruto expected the New God to at least be fast enough to block the attack if not outright dodge it. At the very least Kaguya would have, but then again, Kaguya was pretty unique and probably not the standard for all gods everywhere. What happened next, however fell more in line with his expectations of a god.

If he had blinked even for a second, Naruto would've missed it. So fast was the retaliation despite Darkseid's enormous size, that it left no question as to the fact that the New God had allowed himself to be hit in the first place. Literally before Green Lantern could even begin to straighten from his overextended punch, Darkseid decided to punch him back, **hard**.

The impact of the god's fist meeting the indestructible force-field right above Green Lantern's face, created a massive shockwave as the force-field shattered, and the space cop was accelerated backwards, like a rocket. Green Lantern slammed into and then through a lamppost before punching a hole into the side of a building, and then caving in a wall further inside. That also seemed to be the signal for the Parademons to attack for they all simultaneously charged at the downed member of the Green Lantern Corps.

Like a bolt of lightning, Flash took off to protect his injured friend, followed by Superman who scythed dozens of Parademons out of the sky with his heat vision. Wonder Woman was right behind them, her arms aglow and wreathed in her newfound lightning powers, throwing enhanced punches and kicks that combined her incredible strength and the power of lightning together, to blast Parademons out of existence with each blow.

Aquaman and Mera chased after the super-speeding trio, the Atlanteans using their own slightly less impressive speed to cross the distance quickly. Mera's eyes shone a luminous sky blue as weapons of solid water formed from every water source nearby – the largest being the ocean – and shot towards the enemy forces, tearing Parademons apart left and right. Meanwhile Aquaman with his trident was a mix of bludgeoning, stabbing, punching, kicking and the occasional headbutt to anything in his path. His golden weapon flashing through the air, left, up, backwards, forwards, down and right, like an angry bumblebee.

Besides Naruto, Victor Stone's arm turned into a white noise canon, while on each of his shoulders two turrets appeared on ball mounts, swiveling left and right. From his back two thruster packs appeared and he rose till he was six feet above the ground and began firing a steady stream of super-heated plasma bolts at every flying Parademon nearby. Acting as an anti-air deterrent for the Parademons trying to head deeper in the city.

Batman pulled out a few Batarangs to begin assisting but Naruto raised his hand to stop him, and said. "Don't bother with that Batman. You and Victor need fall back to a building rooftop or some other high ground. He can shoot down the flyers while covering you, but we need you to assess the battle and find out what that god's weakness is. We need a plan to defeat him quickly and you are our best strategist. The rest of us will buy you the time you need."

"You are scared of him." Batman observed, sounding almost casual despite the ongoing violence around them.

"Of course I am." Naruto admitted in a reluctant show of his true emotions to the man. "I've already fought a deity before, so I already know what I am in for, the rest of you don't. Worse yet, from what I can feel, this guy is even stronger than the goddess I battled. I barely walked away from that battle alive, but none of us will survive this one if we don't all work as one unit. Engaging him without a plan was a big mistake."

Frowning Batman said. "What's done is done Sage. I will figure something out, but for now, you Superman and Wonder Woman look like our best hope of stalling him. When will your full power return?"

"As best as I can tell, In a few minutes. Unfortunately against a god, a few minutes might as well be tomorrow or next year. I guess I'll just have to do this the old fashioned way." Naruto said with a frown, before cracking his knuckles in the palm of each hand. "Just keep Victor out of trouble and have him focus only on shooting down the Parademons in the sky, Darkseid is way beyond either of you and it would be difficult to end this war without a mind as gifted as yours. The rest of us will handle Darkseid in the meantime. "

With that Naruto jumped into air, crossing a hundred meter distance in an instant. A Parademon spotting him, flew low and directly into his path to stop him but he punched it right towards Darkseid on the ground, the action canceling out his own forward momentum and making him drop from the air like a rock. Darkseid, backhanded the improvised parademon projectile aside almost negligently, but in doing so created the opening Naruto wanted.

His feet had barely hit the ground before he shot forward at hyper-sonic velocities, creating an impressive shockwave in the process that scattered the parademons attempting to surround him. Darkseid was standing with his right hand still hanging somewhat to his side, after backhanding his minion. It was only for a second and barely something most people could take advantage of, but most people weren't Naruto.

In an instant Naruto was there besides the giant, and then he shot past Darkseid or would have had he not grabbed onto Darkseid's still extended arm and held on like his life depended on it. His sheer acceleration more than sufficient to pull Darkseid completely off balance and nearly topple him. This also served to distract him from paying attention to a charging Superman who chose that exact moment to drive his fist into the New God's face...hard.

To the Parademons bearing witness, if they even had the mental capacity to properly appreciate and process what had just happened, they would have acknowledged it as something they had never seen before. A mortal laying a god among gods flat out on his back with a punch, and it certainly wouldn't be the last time that Superman would do this to Darkseid.

Not wanting to give him a chance to rise again, Wonder Woman jumped high in the air, intent on bringing her sword down to stab Darkseid through the heart and complete the ancient mission of the Amazon's. Unfortunately all the heroes had done so far was knock Darkseid onto his back, and while Naruto had let go of Darkseid after setting him up for Superman to land his punch, Darkseid had decided to hold on to Naruto instead. With barely any exertion on the part of the god, he tossed the blond ninja straight into Diana at Mach 8.

"Uuugh!"..."Ooooff!" The duo groaned as the collided with each other in a thunderclap of power, before bowling over a nearby tree, which snapped in half from the sheer impact, and then slamming into an abandoned car where they ended up in a array of tangled limbs. It was mere luck that Diana didn't skewer Naruto with her sword during the collision, and it took a moment for the two to extricate themselves from each other and regain their bearings.

The duo were in the midst of recovering when Aquaman tried to stab Darkseid in the face with a mighty roar, but Darkseid in a surprising show of speed sidestepped the attack and punched the Atlantean away. Lucky the King of Atlantis blocked the retaliatory attack with his trident instead of his body, and as a result was only blasted into nearby building.

Darkseid's eyes lit up with crimson power, in order to incinerate Aquaman but several spears and swords of water slammed into his face. They did not even make a scratch on his terrifying visage, but the sheer heat from Darkseid's eye beams caused the water to burst into steam, concealing the battlefield for half a second.

A wave of Darkseid's hand immediately cleared away the steam, and it came just in time for Flash to appear from seemingly nowhere with a piece of steel piping which he slammed into Darkseid's face at 90% of the speed of light. Their was an explosion of light and energy as the metal pipe simply vanished and Darkseid flew backwards for a few hundred meters, bouncing and tumbling head over heels before he rolled over and stopped in a crouch, then slowly rose to his feet. His face was covered in black soot, unfortunately their was no clear visual indicator of him having taken any damage. Darkseid did look pissed though.

Almost on instinct the entire team of heroes save Batman and Victor, quickly assembled around the Flash, almost protectively. It made sense, with him having done the most damage to their enemy so far, even if it was just cosmetic damage. Turning to Superman the speedster asked. "Now what? That didn't seem to do anything"

Before the Man of Steel could reply, Darkseid cut in. "Now, you die!"

The New God raised his arms above his head, each one glowing a brilliant red and then shifting to white as he channeled enormous amounts of destructive power into the limbs. His intent was clear, to bring them down and unleash all that energy in an instant. The shockwave and sheer amount of destructive energy would likely kill most of the more human members of the team on impact, as well as level an untold amount of the neighborhood, possibly city. Naruto knew he couldn't let that happen, so he reacted immediately.

"Diana, catch his right arm." It was all Naruto had time to say to the woman before he had to move. He would have told Superman but he wasn't sure if the alien would do as instructed or take a second to think about it, a second that they really didn't have. Diana trusted him far more than anyone else on the team, and wouldn't question him.

The duo blurred forward with speeds that impressed even the Flash before stopping on either side of Darkseid, just in time for the Apokoliptan god to bring down both arms. Their should've been an explosion of light and shockwave of incinerating power that would reduced the local landscape to nightmare vision resembling Darkseid's homeworld. Instead, the attack was stopped dead in its tracks, caught upon Naruto and Diana's forearms and held firmly in place. However this little victory came at a cost.

"Gaaaaaaahh!"

A scream tore from Naruto's throat of its own volition as he felt his very skin begin to sizzle and bubble under the overwhelming godly power of Darkseid. The blindingly radiant energy contained in each of dark god's arms began to eat at Naruto's skin and flesh in a way he hadn't experienced since before he befriended Kurama and purified its chakra. Only this was thousands of times worse than the damage done by the corrosive chakra of the 4 Tailed Berserker state he used to go into whenever he got angry enough. Yet, not even for a second did Naruto contemplate dropping Darkseid's arm.

Gritting his teeth Naruto kept Darkseid's left arm in place, his only feeling of relief coming from the knowledge that Diana was not similarly injured from touching Darkseid's glowing right arm. Apparently her metal bracelets were powerful enough to withstand the godly attack somehow. A part of him wanted to know where she got them and whether he could get a pair of his own, with an ANBU pattern, he was still a ninja after all. The rest of him was focused on ignoring the mind-breaking pain cause by the foul energies trying to invade his body and break it down to its composite atoms.

Thankfully for his pain tolerance, this all happened in the span of seconds, and before Darkseid could even react to his foiled attack, Naruto yelled. "Superman!"

As if knowing exactly what he was thinking, Superman appeared in blur of his own speed and delivered the most powerful and vicious uppercut in the history of Earth directly to Darkseid's chin. The sheer power of the shockwave generated from the impact was enough to scatter both Naruto and Diana in separate directions, and launch Darkseid straight out of the city like a rocket. Naruto wouldn't have been surprised if the New God found himself in orbit after that.

"Gaargh! Damn it!" Naruto grunted as he got back to his feet with fancy kick up, his hands hanging uselessly at his sides too badly burnt and painful to be of any immediate use. Thankfully, his regenerative healing still worked, and even Darkseid for all his terrible power, didn't seem to have the ability to negate it or at least had chosen not to use it. Otherwise Naruto would've been truly screwed.

"You're hurt." He heard Mera speak up, as she ran up to him from somewhere nearby. There was a strange amount of concern directed towards him in the pretty redhead's voice that surprised the ninja. Naruto liked it.

He winced in pain as he tried to move his arms but immediately relented, settling for simply replying. "I am already healing, I will be fine in a little bit."

"You need to fall back. You are no good to us like this." Green Lantern said flying down to them, after scanning Naruto with his ring.

Naruto shook his head, stubbornly gritting his teeth through the pain and replied. "No, I need to go on the attack."

"Don't be foolish my friend. You are hurt and until you heal, you will just get in the way." This time it was Aquaman who spoke up, having regrouped with everyone around Naruto. The others didn't say anything but he could tell they all agreed with the Atlantean King.

Sighing he said. "You misunderstand. I need to go on the attack, true, but I don't mean this me. I've already created an army of myself that is standing by and ready for action. I just need to bring them all here."

"You mean your copies right?" Superman asked, understanding what Naruto intended to do.

To which he nodded and then turned in the direction that the fastest of them, the only one who had yet to regroup with the team. The Flash was just finishing his fight with a few of the remaining Parademons, the other invaders having already been killed off or followed after their master, wherever he had been punched to by Superman. Naruto had no doubt that Darkseid would be back soon and it was best they not waste time.

"Yes, I just need one them here for this. Flash!" Naruto said, before yelling for the red and gold garbed hero.

"I'm here." The speedster replied, materializing in front of them from a bolt of golden lightning, a millisecond later.

"Go get me one of my clones, I got something in mind but I need one them over here right now, before Darkseid gets back." Naruto spoke with an air of urgency.

"On it." The speedster replied and then simply vanished, faster than even Naruto's eyes could follow. _'Had he gotten faster.'_

"Will one clone be enough?" Asked Wonder Woman in a concerned tone.

"For what I need? Yes." Was all Naruto managed before the Flash reappeared with a perfect copy of Naruto besides him. The clone looked around at the destruction before settling on the original's injuries, a worried expression appearing on his face as he did so.

"I heard you wanted to see me." The clone said giving him a thorough once over, before focusing on his arms and adding in a dry tone. "And by the way, you look like shit boss."

Naruto snorted in response to the clones comment. His arms had healed enough to move so he threw a palm sized rock at the clone who easily caught it and raised an eyebrow at the action. With smirk Naruto said. "Like you could do any better against Darkseid! Not that getting the shit kicked out of me wasn't expected, he's a god after all. Anyway, I need you to put a Flying Thunder-god marker on that stone. I overloaded my chakra pathways earlier and they are still healing." The clone winced before it grumbled something unflattering under his breath, but still did as ordered. Once the mark was in place it tossed the rock into the middle of the street. Seeing the job done he added. "Before you dispel, I need every clone not protecting civilians to get their ass over here now. We have another god to battle, and this guy is far stronger than Kaguya ever was."

With the message delivered, the clone dispelled itself and spread its memories to the others. The cloud of smoke from its dispersal hadn't even fade away before they started appearing, hundreds of Naruto's clones, materializing around the stone baring the Flying Thunder-god marker. Every single one of them already in Sage Mode and glaring upwards, in the direction of the New God and his Parademons, clearly in anticipation of the coming battle.

It was time to stop playing around and deal with this god in the only way mortals had ever been able to do so since the beginning of time across the Omniverse. By fighting them with full intent to kill and a desperation born of an almost insane desire to live...that and sprinkling of a miracle on the side.

Turning to his clones Naruto barked a final order. "Go bring me that gods head!" _'It felt good to say that.'_ He thought.

The unified chorus of "Yes Sir" that they responded with made Naruto give a smile so bloodthirsty that it sent shivers up his fellow teammates collective spines. Then with a flare of their chakra, the clones all entered into their Kurama Sage Chakra Modes before shooting off into the sky in pursuit of the evil god.

VvV

Darkseid frowned as he hovered somewhere in the outer atmosphere of the planet. This changed things, this newcomer was an unexpected development in the invasion plan. Even from where he was floating, the god could clearly see the newcomer's glowing army of copies rising into the skies with clear intent to attack him. Making copies wasn't an especially complicated trick, in the many millennia since his rise to power, Darkseid had seen a dozen different versions of that same trick. His battle instincts however told him that it would be an unexpectedly effective trick in this situation when coupled by the newcomers physical prowess.

From the minute he had laid eyes on this version of the Justice League, Darkseid had known that something was different. He had already defeated and killed the Kryptonian called Superman many times, in other iterations of this universe, along with his fellow teammates. He had done it so many times in fact, that he wasn't even taking this whole fight seriously.

It would simply be unbecoming of a 4th Dimensional divine being such as himself, a being that literally existed beyond the universe itself, to take a fight with anything confined to the 3rd Dimension seriously. Not to mention he was rather distracted with finding his daughter Grail, a child he had conceived with an Amazon assassin over 1500 years ago. A demigoddess who had somehow inherited his Omega Effect and evil, whereas his fully divine children had failed. He intended to make her his heir or a weapon against his foes, perhaps both.

However, even in his distracted state, Darkseid was fully aware of one thing. Throughout the Multiverse, across every Earth he had conquered, the heroes that came to the worlds defense were largely the same.

It was almost always the Kryptonian, the insane human dressed like a Bat, The Amazon Princess and The Speedforce conduit that were the groups core members. With at least one human Green Lantern member, the Atlantean King, as well as either the Champion from the Rock of Eternity or a Green Martian. Generally 7 to 8 members with very little divergence in the group, and as a result he always killed them in much the same way.

However on this Earth, not only did the Justice League have 9 members, one of them was this newcomer whom he did not recognize from any of the other Earth's he'd conquered, not to mention his powers were unfamiliar. They were not magic, but rather a form of life-force unlike anything he had ever felt before, not to mention there was something else in him, something truly ancient. Had Darkseid been any other god, Old or New, this unknown factor would've been enough to give him pause and make him wary.

Unfortunately he was Darkseid, Lord of Apokolips, and this newcomer wasn't a threat to him at all. Darkseid had killed entire teams of Justice League members and blown up numerous iterations of the planet Earth. That the newcomer was even weaker than Superman, made him almost worth completely disregarding...almost. No matter how worthless the creature was, Darkseid couldn't deny that his strange abilities made this battle intriguing.

The newcomer was no Kryptonian, Speedforce conduit, Amazon or even clever like the man pretending to be a bat. But Darkseid could tell that he had a bit of everything that his fellow champions of Earth possessed, the very things that had made Darkseid respect them even after slaughtering them so many times, albeit begrudgingly.

Like the Bat human, he had a mind for strategy and a disregard for fair play when engaged in combat. His speed was not quite up to the Speedforce conduit's level but quite impressive, faster than the Kryptonian when he wasn't flying at least. His durability and strength was around the Amazon princess's level, and he had similar skill in combat it seemed. He also possessed the Kryptonian's sheer determination and ability to rally his comrades.

The Newcomer also seemed to have a unique talent for adaptation and creativity, allowing him to anticipate and choose the best moment to act in any given situation, turning things to his advantage. He had after all been the sole reason Superman had even managed to punch him so effectively...twice. Strangely, the Newcomer didn't seem to be entirely aware of this power, and was seemingly acting on pure instinct. All in all, it was all a pleasant surprise for Darkseid and if nothing else kept this battle from becoming tedious.

Perhaps when he was finished here, he would spare this Earth. If only to see whether it could entertain him further in the Millennia to come. They had earned that much in his opinion, but first he had a Justice League to defeat and a missing daughter to find.

VvV

When the battle began anew, the other superheroes fell back to Batman's position to observe. With over 2000 clones on the battlefield, or in this case, the sky, there really wasn't any space to join in. The Gothamite hero had hooked up his computer and satellites to Victor who was tracking Darkseid and the clones via drone camera's, satellite imagery and his own array of imaging systems. Batman was then monitoring all that information and instructing Victor on what to focus on. The two made a great pair for the purpose of information gathering, tactical analysis and strategy.

When the clones first engaged Darkseid, he initially took a few hits from the clones deliberately. Naruto didn't know if it was his pride or something else, unfortunately Naruto and by extension his clones, just weren't strong enough to harm Darkseid in any meaningful way. The New God actually took great pleasure in incinerating his clones or simply punching them back to Earth.

Golden meteors, which where in fact clones being punched out of the sky and down to Earth were now a pretty common sight. Their own durability in Kurama Sage Mode ensuring that they didn't immediately die when he punched, but it left them weakened enough that when they finally collided with the planet they did dispel in massive shockwaves. It was a fate that Naruto felt was considerably better than being incinerated by Darkseid's eye beams, any clones hit by those beams simply ceased to exist. No memories or chakra ever returned to him.

All in all, the whole battle was more akin to a slaughter than anything else, in which Naruto kept throwing bodies at the god to keep him busy. However, that would do the heroes no good, so in true Naruto fashion, the Konoha shinobi or more specifically his clones, decided to improvise. If he couldn't hit hard enough to hurt Darkseid, because he wasn't at Superman's level's of strength, then all he needed to do was go faster. Just like the Flash had shown him earlier.

There was distinct difference in the feeling of a tennis ball hitting you at 60 mph versus a tennis ball hitting you 600 mph, one hit a lot harder than the other. Naruto's fist were a lot heavier than a tennis ball, and his top speed was slightly faster than Light. The ninja's clones decided to combine the two, and suddenly Darkseid started taking some real hits.

VvV

"He's doing it, he's winning." Flash said optimistically as they watched clones flying back and forth in a golden blaze at such speeds the Atmosphere around them ignited and formed cloaks of super-heated plasma around their glowing bodies. When they would pick up enough speed, they would then slam into Darkseid hard enough they would pop, but also leave what amounted to explosions in the hundreds of megatons.

The cloud layer above them had actually dispersed from the first of these impacts and so far they had witness over thirty. The shockwaves so powerful that even on the ground what windows still remained undamaged in the city rattled violently.

The only reason someone like Batman could even process the speeds of the various attacks, was because he had every satellite within the area pointed straight down at the area they were fighting in, and every camera on this side of the planet point up. Victor was then taking all the footage and the radio waves in the air, bouncing them back and forth before running it through his own systems and then compiling a 3D video of the battlefield, slowed down enough for Batman to analyze.

"No he's not." The Dark Knight cut in with a shake of his head. Despite the fact that each of the clones were attacking faster and faster with each second, they were still losing.

Green Lantern frowned as he heard this and said. "Why do you have to be such a downer Batman, clearly he is turning Darkseid into a ping pong ball."

"Look closer. Just the speed necessary to impact him hard enough to send Darkseid flying is killing Sage's clones. Every hit is like a kamikaze suicide attack, in which his copies are giving their all but failing to do enough damage to Darkseid fast enough for it to matter. Naruto is losing clones fast, far too fast, and worse yet, Darkseid is killing some his clones with his eye beams before they can blitz him. He will run out of clones soon."

"Its true! This was only meant to buy time. Right now, Superman and maybe Wonder Woman are the only ones who can really take him on safely. The rest of us need to focus on distracting him and make an opening for them. I'm sure that after the thrashing we took earlier and seeing Darkseid actually put some effort into this fight, we now understand a bit better exactly what we are up against." Naruto said but he was specifically looking at Green Lantern, as were everyone else.

Looking bewildered by all the stares, Lantern asked. "Why the hell is everyone looking at me?"

"You attacked first and got punched into a building for your trouble." Batman offered helpfully.

"And Sage got his arms burned to a crisp, I don't think he of all people can throw stones at anyone in this situation." Green Lantern defended.

"You were injured due to your own brashness, you attacked Darkseid without back up or a plan. Sage got his arms burned because he and Wonder Woman were trying keep Darkseid from hitting us all with his attack. Most of you would've have survived it but me and Victor likely wouldn't. The difference is simply that, Sage was fighting for the whole team and you weren't. You need to start doing so too, we all need to fight as one team or our world ends tonight." Batman finished heatedly scolding Green Lantern, though he hadn't intended to get so passionate.

"Argh! When you put it like that Spooky, you make me sound like a jackass. Fine, I am sorry for rushing so recklessly, I will do my best to work with everyone as a team." He said, directing his apology to Naruto, his tone was light almost not serious, but had genuineness to it that showed he really meant it.

Naruto nodded as he replied. "Thank you Green Lantern, but to fight as a team we need an actual plan. Batman, have you had any luck with figuring out a weakness or better yet a method to kill that bastard, cause I am running out of clones."

With the question directed at him, Batman responded. "Kill him no! I also haven't seen anyone do anything to really hurt him critically. That said, despite his durability he keeps avoiding Aquaman's trident and Wonder Woman hasn't stabbed him yet, not for lack of trying. He just keeps dodging them, I don't think its a coincidence."

"That sounds reasonable enough, lets try stabbing him. If Aquaman would led me or Flash his weapon, then we can see if this works." Naruto said motioning to himself and the Flash as he eyed the golden weapon in question.

Aquaman however protested vehemently, saying. "This is the symbol of my Kingship over Atlantis, its not something I am willing to just hand over to anyone."

"Well, you are not fast enough to get to him in time, me and Flash are and we still need to stab Darkseid. If he even looks at you while you go on the attack, he will vaporize you with his eye beams, and unlike Superman's heat vision, even if you somehow dodge, his eye beams can still chase you. Besides, if you aren't willing to hand over the trident and we fail here, you wont have a Kingdom to rule over at the end of the day, cause the world will end." Naruto said seriously, reminding the Atlantean king of the consequence of failure.

Aquaman hesitated, a thoughtful look appearing in his eyes, before he said "I'll think abou-"

Unfortunately he never finished the sentence, a warning flared to life on the HUD installed under his cowl and Bruce Wayne looked up in horror. "Brace for Impact!"

They were the last words Batman yelled before something fell from the sky and crashed into the Earth with enough force to topple the nearby skyscrapers. The impacting throwing the heroes unceremoniously of their collective feet, as hurricane force winds and dust sprung up from the center of the explosion and threw them everywhere.

VvV

A mushroom cloud of condensed dust and other particulates formed over the entire harbor area. The whole battlefield was covered in it, blinding everyone from seeing through it except Superman. Thankfully it all cleared quickly enough to reveal Darkseid standing in the midst of hundreds of Naruto clones, each of them popping slowly, one after another.

The New God wasn't looking too good either, his granite-like face, looking surprisingly messed up. His helmet-like headgear was half-destroyed, their was soot and gaping cracks all over his once pristine armor, which now looked like it had been the chew toy of some kind of cosmic horror. Even his face looked uneven and covered in scratches and minor wounds, with his lip having been visibly busted up enough to leak some blood. Despite this evil tyrant was grinning, like he was enjoying this.

"**Is that all your world has to offer heroes?"** He asked in a thunderous but clearly mocking voice that could be heard for miles around. If not for the fact that he was clearly taunting them, he would've sounded almost genuinely disappointed. From what Naruto was picking up through his empathy, Darkseid was actually amused.

"We are not done, not by a long shot Darkseid." Superman replied. The strength of his voice rallying the heroes and giving them hope, as they got back to their feet.

"**Then come and fight me, let us see how long it takes my Omega Beams to reduce you to ashes!"** The god challenged, with his eyes flaring to brilliant crimson in the same sentence. The zigzag pattern of his now named Omega Beams shot straight towards the recovering group of heroes.

Due to their unpredictable movement, no one knew who Darkseid was aiming for and anyone but Wonder Woman, Superman and perhaps Naruto would surely end up dead the minute they hit. Diana decided to take that particular risk off the table right away by charging directly at the Omega Beams and then deflecting them away with her Bracelets.

The Man of Steel then used that opening to flank Darkseid's left side and slam a right hook into the side of his face, disrupting the New God's focus and dissipating the Omega Beams he was projecting. Superman's follow up, left fist landed just as quickly as his right, creating a shockwave with the impact and forcing Darkseid a step back, then his third right actually knocked the New God over.

As he fell to the ground Darkseid performed a combat roll and rose just as Superman came in with a fourth punch, but this time he ducked under the hero as he flew at him. He then grabbed Superman by his cape and yanked him backwards, straight into a clothesline.

Superman yelped as he hit the ground. He barely had time to even groan before Darkseid brought his boot down on his stomach, forcing Superman's body to fold in half at the waist, then pinned him there. The impact shook the ground wit the force of an 7.9 Earthquake on the Richter scale, while Darkseid's eyes lit up to incinerate Batman who was retreating to a safe distance.

He fortunately didn't get a chance because Green Lantern created a massive hammer and slammed it straight into Darkseid's head, preventing him from firing. Unfortunately Darkseid in retaliation whipped Superman around by the cape and slammed the Kryptonians indestructible body into the Lantern Corps member. Their was a loud crack as Green Lantern's right arm shattered from the impact and he was hurled into the distance.

Using Superman as Flail, Darkseid then swung Superman at Naruto, but the ninja ducked under the improvised weapon. Aquaman who had pounced into the air in order to skewer the god with with his trident wasn't so lucky and got hit in the head, launching him across the battlefield. Mera was the next target of Darkseid's improvised bludgeoning tool but Flash was faster than Darkseid's swing and moved Mera out of the way, to safety. However, the impact of Superman with the ground ruptured a gas pipeline and caused an explosion. The energy of the explosion, tossing Flash and Mera to the side and obscuring Darkseid from view.

Wonder Woman burst through the dust, sword in hand and wreathed in lightning. She was ready to skewer Darkseid, but the New God placed Superman in the path of the attack, as human shield. Superman would have ended up with a hole in his stomach had Naruto not suddenly appeared on their flank and kicked the flat side of her blade up, redirecting away from their ally.

He then sweep kicked Darkseid's feet from under him, just as a powerful blast of focused green energy shot forth from a Mech that Green Lantern was piloting and hit the New God in his face. As he stumbled backward his grip loosened, and Diana's Lasso of Truth wound itself around Superman's arm before she pulled him away from the evil god. Superman took that same opportunity to open up with his heat vision on Darkseid, forcing him even further back.

Following her instincts, Diana raised her hands and a massive bolt of lightning came crashing down on Darkseid pinning him in place, while Green Lantern projected a spaceship of some kind high in the sky that shot down at full speed and crashed into the god with catastrophic amount of force. The explosion so powerful it was like a nuke went off, luckily four clones appeared on either side of Darkseid, chakra chains emerging from their backs and instantly creating a barrier around the Dark god and the explosion.

Because they were also inside, they were only able to contain the explosion for a few seconds before they two disintegrated. Though Naruto found himself wondering what the hell was in the spaceship Green Lantern had made, after all it exploded more like a bomb than anything else. He shook his head a second later to clear his thoughts, none of their admittedly impressive teamwork had done the trick of putting down Darkseid. It simply wasn't enough, good thing he had a plan for that.

The dust and smoke cleared enough to see a shadowy figure with crimson glowing eyes in its midst, there was no question as to who it was. Darkseid stepped through the flames looking more battered than he had before. His face a snarl as he thundered. **"You thought chains, explosions and a barrier could stop me?!"**

Naruto shook his head and yelled. "No! But it made you look!"

"**Huh?"** Darkseid responded in confusion. His confusion disappeared when he heard a popping sound behind him, another Naruto clone appeared there after undoing its transformation into a piece of rubble, its hand glowing a vibrant orange-gold. Darkseid spun around with such unbelievable speed it seemed as he teleported in place, his eyes already lit up like an exploding sun, and half a dozen Omega beams shooting out in their trademark zigzag pattern towards the clone. But it was already far too late.

It was a move that would wow the world for generations and cement Naruto's reputation as the craziest member of the Justice League. The shinobi slid into a splits, and swung a punch right into Darkseid's crotch, right before the Omega beams erased the clone from existence. The Impact was like a nuke went off, so powerful that a shockwave of light and overpressure emanated from ground zero, spiderweb cracks formed, spreading out all across the battlefield, except for ground zero. Anything within ten meters of Darkseid and where the clone had been, instantly turned to dust.

Darkseid's eyes bugged out, as despite himself, even a being of his power and magnitude couldn't help but bend over and clutch at his junk. His Apokoliptan battle-skirt and under-armor having done nothing to keep out the concentrated chakra in the clones right arm, from exposing Darkseid to a world of agony only men could ever truly know. Yet it wasn't over.

More clones blitzed in at speeds approaching relativistic. The first giving Darkseid a vicious uppercut in the face as he was crouching over, snapping his head backwards like an elastic band. The impact itself being great enough to pop the clone from sheer backlash, then the second clone with a literal lightning fast dropkick drove both the soles of its boots into Darkseid's chest, shoot him backwards like a missile before it popped.

It was the third clone which while matching the speed of Darkseid's backward acceleration, slammed a dark purple ball of concentrated pure chakra with a shuriken-like ring of wind around it, right into his chest. A **Tailed Beast Rasenshuriken** to be exact.

"I sincerely hope this hurts." The clone said before popping, and by then they were far beyond the city limits. Darkseid didn't even have the time to shield his face with his arms before the technique destabilized and detonated.

**Booooommm!**

A new sun bloomed into existence, in the form of massive ball light over 50 miles into the ocean. The roar and pressure from the detonating Tailed beast Rasenshuriken easily displacing the water around it till it formed Tsunami-like waves. Winds with more power than an EF-5 tornado swept towards the city, while every remaining structure in the harbor area that had not already been leveled by the fighting earlier, simply collapsed.

As for Darkseid? There was no sign of him. The original Naruto wasn't so naive as to think the New God had been defeated by something like a Tailed Beast Rasenshuriken, Darkseid was clearly tougher than that. Still, it seemed the Ruler of Apokolips had been for the moment at least, literally blown away.

VvV

"He's out there." Naruto said as he looked towards the thick cloud of steam that remained in the wake of his Tailed Beast Rasenshuriken's detonation. Darkseid was somewhere out there.

"You nuked him. You literally nuked the bastard. He should be dead, and you probably should've told us you can do that." Green Lantern said, his voice a mix of excitement, disbelief and a smidgen of fear as he added. "What kind of ninja did you say you were again."

Naruto gave the space cop a blank look as he sarcastically replied. "Right, cause its just so easy to slip in, _'I can hurl balls of energy that detonate with power north of a 50 gigaton nuclear explosion'_ into a conversation with a couple of people I only just met today and have every go normal. That kind of knowledge is scary to people at the best of times, and they tend to treat you like you might snap any second and kill them. I'd personally prefer it if you didn't all suddenly treat me like a ticking time bomb, kind of like you are doing right now Lantern. Which is ironic considering Superman can probably benchpress the planet or at least the moon, and no one is worried about him dropping it on us."

"Sorry, and Point taken. Still, the radiation." Green Lantern conceded

Naruto shook his head and said. "There is none, its not a true a nuke. Its chakra, weaponized life-force, so no radiation."

Superman whistled as he said. "To think life-force can do that. You must be very connected to life."

"I like to think so. My code name is Sage after all, and I am actually am Sage." Naruto responded

"**To get back on topic, you said that you think Darkseid will be back?**" Batman decided to interrupt over the comms.

"Definitely!" Naruto responded without hesitation. The god was far too powerful to die that easily, even if that had been the most powerful attack his clones had thrown at him tonight. "Early Superman punched him harder than my Tailed Beast Ball detonated and he came back just fine from that. He'll be back."

"**Then we shouldn't let our guard down. We need to figure out where you nuked him to.**" Batman finished.

"I can't pick him up with my enhanced vision and hearing." Superman announced as he looked left and right, scanning the world with his X-Ray vision as he liked to call it.

Sighing in frustration Naruto added. "I can't find him either. Its like he just blanketed the entire area with so much of his darkness and evil, that my negative emotion sensing is effectively useless. I also can't sense his divine power for some reason."

"None of the life in the water has detected him so far, but most of the sea life fled when the fighting began, or died with the shockwave from your nuke." Aquaman reported, clearly unhappy with Naruto for the amount of sea life the Tailed Beast Rasenshuriken killed.

"The land animals and birds fled too." Diana chipped in.

"I can run around and see what I find." Flash offered as he stood at the edge of the docks.

"That sounds good, my remaining clones can join you. If one of them runs into Darkseid and dies, I will know exactly where he is." Naruto said, liking the idea.

"**That wont be necessary, the Speedforce conduit won't be going anywhere."** A voice announced from ether, before a massive hand reached out from the water below the docks and wrapped around Flash's entire leg. There was a loud crack as his femur shattered, and then before the speedster could scream or anyone else could even react, the Flash found himself being flung, at hypersonic velocities out towards the ocean. Superman was about to chase after the Speedster, but suddenly an overwhelming amount of killing intent slammed into the remaining heroes as Darkseid made his divine "presence" felt.

From the water, the New God emerged with an ethereal glow around his body. It was the one place that no one really expected him to return from, and with the only person fast enough to properly react to him already flying out towards the ocean, no one was quite able to react to what Darkseid did next.

Superman, Wonder Woman and a dozen of Naruto's remaining clones tried though. They instantly went on the attack, swarming Darkseid from all sides. The original Naruto would've been at their sides too, but he felt his instincts flare a warning at him. Instincts which quickly proved themselves to be right when Darkseid's hands began glowing again, shifting from crimson to pure white in an microsecond.

Naruto expected him to try and slam the energy in the ground like he tried before, instead Darkseid clapped his hands together just as the clones, Superman and Wonder Woman got close. There was an explosion of power, in which sound, pressure and light seemed to just mix and Naruto felt his clones simply vanish.

His eardrums burst, as a wall of pure energy slam into him and hurled him through the debris field left by half dozen fallen buildings. Naruto smashed into a building after building, carving his way right through them like a hot knife through butter. Solid metal, rock and glass all parting around him like a river around a rock, with him being the rock. Naruto finally slowed to a stop after a quarter mile, his back a giant bleeding bruise at that point.

He almost immediately leaped back to his feet despite his dislocated left arm, stressed spine and broken ribs, one of which one had punctured a lung and was currently filling his chest cavity with blood. His regeneration would take care of it if he just sat still for a few seconds, but their was no time. Darkseid could and likely would murder all his allies before he could even finished healing, and he from what he could sense, Superman and Wonder Woman had been knocked a lot further away from the others than himself. He was the strongest one left.

With a burst of speed that jolted every injury and sent pain through his entire body, Naruto returned to the battlefield. Flash was still gone, Superman and Wonder Woman were over a mile away from what he could sense and there was no sign of Green Lantern. Luckily Victor and Batman who were furthest from the battlefield were crawling their way out of the debris with minor injuries. The damage received from Darkseid last attack being exponentially greater the closer you were to the epicenter.

Which left only Aquaman and Mera, and from what he could see, the two Atlanteans were not looking too good. Mera was bleeding from a bad looking gash on her forehead and was favoring her left leg, her right was horrifically mangled. Her sexy green fish-scale outfit had tears in it and scorch marks everywhere. Aquaman on the other hand looked relatively intact save for the fact he was so dazed he couldn't tell up from down at the moment. This was of course a very bad thing since Darkseid was looking straight at him with a the creepiest smirk Naruto had ever seen, and he'd seen Madara smile in glee.

Mera must have seen it cause she yelled to Aquaman. "King Orin get up, you need to move right now."

Her words only seemed to make Darkseid's smile widen, as if he was enjoying her panic. The dizzy King of Atlantis however could only respond with. "Mera?"

"Its me my liege, now get up, you are not safe." She said, as she limped towards her King. When he failed to do that, she desperately said. "Please Arthur. You need to get up."

It was like Darkseid was simply waiting for those final words, because his eyes lit up and he fired his Omega Beams straight Aquaman, fully intent to immolate the incapacitated King, in front of the beautiful redhead. Mera let out a scream that was both panic and defiance as she put pressure on her injured leg and jumped between the Omega Beams and her King, clearly intent on dying for him.

Naruto however couldn't let that happen, and at that exact moment he dug in deep for his chakra, regardless of whether his pathways were okay enough to use or not. He was going to save his teammates, even if it meant he blew up his chakra pathway system and killed himself. Somewhere deep inside his soul, he swore he would not let this brave woman die a fiery death, and in that very place something responded to his convictions.

Unknown to him there was a pulse from his godslayer mark, then the world around him stretched and twisted in ways was not meant to, and when things returned to normal, he was there. The Omega Beams were already mere millimeters from Mera's face and chest, but moving at a snail pace. There was no more time, but Naruto was close enough to do something, and so he pushed the woman behind him and simply braced himself to take on the full power of Darkseid's Omega Beams directly. He already knew that this was the same as courting death.

A moment later and Naruto's world, his whole existence exploded in fire and pain for what felt like an entire lifetime, and then everything simply went black.

VvV

**[Wow! I mean just wow!]** A voice said as he came to consciousness, his body seemingly floating around in the nothingness of the void once more. The voice sounded neither distinctly male or female, but rather like a blend of both sexes. Naruto remembered this place, he had been here once before. Right after Kaguya banished him with her last bit of power.

"Whose there?!" Naruto asked, as he fruitlessly turned and twisted his astral body around to see who it was that spoke to him. Unfortunately he found no one, no matter which direction he looked in. It was just an endless abyss as far as he could tell, with nothing in any direction, forever.

A part of him momentarily wondered if he had imagined the events of the last three weeks. If perhaps he had never left the Abyss in the first place and his subconscious desire to be hero had manifested itself in a some extremely vivid dream or hallucination of a world that needed heroes. The last moments of a dying man so to speak.

Before his mind could go any further down this trail, he was dissuaded from such thoughts by the same voice which spoke up and assured him that it was all very real. [**Oh don't worry, Its just me! The person who saved you from oblivion. You remember that right? Floating in an endless abyss much like this one, after Kaguya chucked you out of reality itself. So yes, that actually happened, and so did everything that followed after, including fighting Darkseid and dying at his hands**]

"I'm dead." Naruto said in resignation, he had expected to die but somehow he had hoped he hadn't. He had no regrets though, he had died protecting the world. The fact that he had also saved a pretty redhead was something that when got to the afterlife and found his parents, his mother would find both amusing and tragic.

[**But of course, or we wouldn't be having this little impromptu meeting. Well don't worry about it, you are not completely dead, just enough so that we could talk a little. You should recover nicely when I'm done here.**] The voice said as if coming back to life was the most ordinary thing in the world

"I get live." This time Naruto couldn't hide his shock.

He got the impression that the voice was nodding as it replied. **[ Yes. Its only fair, considering I let you die so that we could talk. Now when I found you in the endless void, I was very impressed that you didn't immediately disintegrate and turn into nothing. You are after all, not really that powerful.**]

"You...you're the one who saved me?" Naruto questioned in surprise

The voice sounded a little irritated as it replied. [**Didn't I make that obvious already. Yes, that was me, though the order to do so came down from the big boss himself. He wanted me to drop you off on Earth, after a bit of an upgrade to your body and your abilities. Let me tell you kid, you were a mess and it took a bit of work to turn you into what you are now.**]

"I'm sorry, I am not really following. What did you turn me into?" Naruto asked.

The voice sounded surprised as it replied. [**Surely you've figured it out by now. You never asked yourself, why you keep reacting so negatively to Darkseid, why you reacted to his Parademons, why you were able to tell that Diana of Themyscira's powers felt divine.**]

"I..." Naruto paused, he didn't know what to say. The voice was right, he had reacted to all those things but he didn't know why. In the end he had chalked it all up to instinct or something along those lines. With all the fighting and Darkseid being right there, he had no time to figure out why he was able to do any of that, he just acted. Now though...

Before he could think too deeply into it, the voice seemed to get impatient and said. [**Do I really need to spell it out for you. Fine, you are godkiller Naruto. A rare mortal with the ability to kill gods. Well, any godslayer can do pretty much the same thing I guess, but you are more than just some lucky runt with the power kill a god, and steal a bit of its powers. No, this is not just something you can do, its something you've been charged to do by those that the very gods consider to be their gods, the gods of the gods so to speak. Anyway, your duty is to kill rogue gods and to reverse the unjust disasters and curses that they would bring upon humanity and other mortals.**]

"I'm a godkiller!" Naruto uttered, the words sounding hollow as they left his lips.

The voice went on explaining. [**You were already a godslayer when I found you, a guy who through some random luck killed a god and was marked because of it. I took that mark, upgraded it and turned you into something more than just a godslayer. A godkiller exist to create balance, gods have duty's and they are necessary in the world, but when they do not do their duty, you come along to bring about their end, which resets them to default. And to be clear just because you have this power does not mean we are allowing you to just go on killing rampage against every god or goddess you meet. A lot of restraint and good judgment is required to wield this power. In the past you've shown quite a bit of both, which is why you were chosen to wield it.**]

"I'm honored." Naruto finally said, and he was. This was duty beyond his wildest dreams and something that if he could master gave Earth a hope against Darkseid.

The voice sounded proud as it said. [**You should be, but enough about all that. What I find interesting above all else is that you haven't really used your Godkiller powers. Don't get me wrong, whether you used them or not against Darkseid, he would've still handed you your ass. You are a newborn baby godkiller and he is the level 100 endgame boss with max stats in everything. Still to piss him off so thoroughly and go so far with just those weak Demigod powers that Hagoromo passed on to you. I gotta say, I am beyond impressed, I literally have no words to describe my awe of you Naruto Uzumaki. Seriously I am quite literally in awe of you Naruto, and that's something that I thought stopped happening to me a couple of billion years ago. So now, I simply can't wait to see what you do with the Godkiller powers I gave you.**]

"I thank you. Who are you?" Naruto asked.

[**I was wondering when you would ask that question, I can't tell you yet though, at least not yet. Don't worry, we will speak again soon and you wont have to die for us to do so. There is much I still need to tell you but you first need to be better equipped to handle the weight of that kind of knowledge, right now your mind would just break. Believe me, my very existence will quite literally shatter your world view. That said, I suppose if you need a tittle to call me, for now, you can call me Boss, cause that's actually who I am to you!**] It responded, with a hint of amusement.

"Um...alright Boss!" Naruto said cautiously testing the word. This was a truly bizarre situation, even more so than the usual weirdness that surrounded his life.

[**Oh my, you are so cute Naruto. I really wish I had more time to talk with you, but well, you are already reviving and your buddies need you to deal with Darkseid. I gotta admit thought, your friends are pretty hot, not that I'm into you mortals, cause that never ends well and I got my eyes on another bu-**] The voice suddenly faded.

VvV

"_Naruto."_

He thought he heard something, but Naruto wasn't entirely sure. The dream, vision or whatever it was he had just experienced was already fading from memory.

"_Naruto."_

The sound came again, it sounded familiar, both the voice and what was being said. He even identified it as distinctly female.

"Naruto."

_'Yes, I definitely heard it right, who ever was speaking is calling my name.'_ He thought to himself as slowly returned to consciousness.

"Naruto!" The next time his name was called, the voice was loud enough that it hurt his newly regenerated ears.

"Gaarh! Please, whoever you are, stop screaming in my ear. I am still regenerating." He cried out while covering his ears with hands.

The female voice audibly sighed in relief as she said. "Oh thank Hera you are alive. Don't move, you're hurt very badly." _'Hera? That could only be Diana.'_

"Diana?" Naruto asked forcing his eyes open, they stung terribly, like someone had pour chili sauce in them. Ignoring the pain, Naruto noted that the world was blurry and out of focus but his vision was slowly returning. He could make out the movement of a shadowy figure sitting on his right, and another on his left side.

"Yes, I am here and so is Mera." Diana responded, clarifying mysterious the identity of the other figure.

Naruto quickly realized he was half naked. The only thing that had survived Darkseid's Omega Beams were his trousers which was now a pair of tattered shorts and Tsunade's crystal around his neck. There was a jacket was covering his naked chest, while his bare feet healed from a plethora of burns, cuts and bruises. Then their was his head, Naruto could feel a distinct lack of hair on his head as the wind caressed it. Groaning in embarrassment at his sudden boldness, he chose to instead ask. "What happened?"

"You saved Mera and Aquaman's lives, and in the process kept Darkseid "busy", long enough for me and Superman to recover. Flash also survived being thrown into the ocean and managed to get back to land, while Aquaman got off with a mild concussion but is otherwise unharmed. Mera's leg however, is unfortunately going to keep her out of the fight, at least as far as battling Darkseid goes, and Green Lantern isn't much better. His arm was shattered in several places when Darkseid hit him there while using Superman as club. The team can still fight, but we are not at full power anymore, truthfully we are not anywhere close to it. And then there is...Superman." Diana finished her report, looking to the side sadly.

"What happened to him, Diana?" Naruto asked, worried about the alien. This did not sound good.

Shaking her head she replied. "We lost him Naruto. After you went down, those of us who could do so regrouped and tried to avenge you. We thought you were dead, in fact we were sure of it... and Superman got very angry. While we were recovering, Darkseid spent nearly ten minutes trying to burn you to ashes, and your powers kept fighting him the whole way. Mera and Arthur saw whole thing but me and Superman only caught the tail end of it, right when your powers finally failed to protect you from Darkseid. Superman said your heart stopped beating, so he rushed in and tried to stop Darkseid, despite Batman's orders to wait. Instead Darkseid took him out with another blast of his Omega Beams, and then had Superman's unconscious body transported to Apokolips by one of his Parademons. I tried to stop Darkseid, we all did but it was too late to save Superman or you, and we were quickly defeated. If only I knew how to use these new lightning powers you activated better, then I could have saved him, maybe even prevent you from nearly dying."

Noting the tears in the Amazon Princess's eyes, Naruto said. "That wasn't your fault. None of it was."

Diana scowled and replied. "How is it not my fault? Its been the Amazon's mission for the last 2000 years to kill Darkseid, and I am their Princess. I am the strongest Amazon ever, the chosen champion of the gods, and I failed to fulfill that mission! I failed!"

"So what?" Naruto asked.

"Huh?" She replied, confused by his response.

"So what if you failed?" Naruto asked her again, as he finally healed enough to sit up right. Staring into her teary eyes he said. "Failure is as much a part of life as success. It teaches you valuable lessons, giving you regrets that ensure you don't repeat your mistakes, and a drive so that you succeed at your goals the next time. You are not the first Amazon to fail, you wont be the last either. The fact that you failed just makes you human, and last I checked there was nothing wrong with that. Having the will and the courage to get back up and try again though, now that's something heroic. So it doesn't matter if you failed to kill Darkseid or stop him from taking Superman. Get over it and move on. Darkseid is still here, meaning we have another chance to kick his ass and get our friend back, right?"

"But this is Darkseid we are talking about, he has set the whole world on fire, and he wants to kill or capture everybody. He almost killed me but then you saved me, and he tried to kill you. He burnt you so badly your skin began to glow like hot embers, and I couldn't do a damn thing to stop him. How can you be so optimistic at a time like this, how can you even believe we will win, after going through something as traumatic as you just experienced." Mera spoke up, unable to believe that he could be so optimistic after what he just went through.

Looking from one woman to the next and then back, Naruto asked them a simple question in response. "Do either of you want to quit?"

"No!"..."Of course not!" They simultaneously replied.

"Then that's that. Dwelling on the past is pointless, unless you are learning from your failures, then its vital. But right now, we should focus on what we can do, and one thing I can do is keep getting back up to fight. I'm hoping that two of the most beautiful and powerful women I have ever met on this planet will be willing to get up and fight alongside me. I'm also hoping that Batman is still alive and has my plan ready. If so, then hopefully said plan will give us the edge that we desperately need against Darkseid. I need to check my chakra pathways, but hopefully they have healed enough so that I can finally fight at full power. Then we can figure out how to save Superman." Naruto said with a smile.

"That's a lot of things you seem to be hoping for, there." Mera pointed out.

"Well, of course. But the world is depending on us, so if we lose hope then its over for everyone." Naruto replied, before asking. "So are you two willing to join me for another round with that evil giant?"

Rising to her feet Diana looked into the distance and said. "Yeah, I wanna try again. I wont give up."

"That's the spirit. How about you Mera?" Naruto asked turning to the redhead.

"I am willing, but with my leg the way it is. I don't know how useful I will be." She replied with a shrug.

"Then I guess we should take a look at that leg." Naruto said as he tried to stand.

"Wow! Slow down there, you're still hurt and in no condition to do anything." Mera yelled placing a hand on his shoulder. She then looked at her own mangled leg and said. "Neither of us should be moving."

"I a-" Naruto began to say something but paused as he felt a rush of power flow through his body, before smiling. His chakra was pulsing rapidly as it rushed through his chakra pathways, without causing any pain, he was finally healed. So he said. "I am perfectly fine, and it seems that already one of my hopes has come to pass."

With that Naruto's wounds which had been healing at a slow rate from where he had been incinerated by Darkseid's Omega Beams, suddenly began to visibly regenerate at an extremely rapid rate. Damaged flesh simply flaking off and instantly being replaced by new tissue. Even his hair regrew to its former length, and within seconds Naruto was completely hole.

Golden flame-like chakra flickered into existence on his shoulders, little more than small spark at first, but quickly increasing in size like a fire fed on a steady cocktail of oxygen and dry wood. It quickly spread across his body, enveloping him in its warmth. While on his right hand the white Six Paths Yang Seal, surrounded by tomoe in the pattern of a sun reappeared, and along the length of his arm the flame patterns flowed, up to the other seal he had gotten from killing Kaguya, his godslayer – no godkiller – mark appeared.

As he stood up, what was left of his tattered clothes, took on the same golden glow before instantly repairing themselves around his form. With that done Naruto placed a hand above Mera's leg, and his chakra flowed from the Yang seal onto it, easily healing the horribly mangled wound which by rights should've have just been amputated. Mera's shattered right leg simply seemed to twist and bend in a sickening display of contortions, before straightening out as new flesh quickly replaced the old under Naruto's golden chakra. Within seconds, Mera was perfectly fine, much to both her and Diana's amazement.

Naruto's body was fully aglow and wreathed in golden flame like chakra at that point. He then stretched out his fists to both of them and said. "Bump fists with me."

"Um why?" Mera asked.

But Naruto simply insisted. "Just do it. I wanna give you something, but you have to be willing to receive it."

The two girls decided to go along with it and did as instructed, and the second their fist connected they felt a rush of power flow through them, the likes of which only one of them had ever experienced before. Mera smiled basking in the euphoric feel as she said. "Wow, I feel amazing. better than I have in weeks. Thank you."

"No problem." Naruto replied with a kind smile.

It was Wonder Woman who realized what was happening though, as she spoke up saying. "T-this, this is like what you did with me, isn't it, but even stronger."

"Yes. I didn't even think I could connect to other people and draw out their latent abilities until I accidentally did it earlier with you Diana. Then my clones did it again when I was transporting people to the safe zones earlier. Normally when teleporting others, I am covering them in my chakra, like a blanket and just moving the blanket which in turn moves the people, it has no effect on their physiology, and even using chakra to heal people doesn't really do anything else but heal. However this is different, from what I have gathered, I am connecting to their inner life-force and unlocking something that's already there. Normal humans don't have chakra pathways or much chakra so I have no idea what I am unlocking, but with Diana, she got lightning powers. So the question is, what did you get Mera?" Naruto asked the redheaded Atlantean.

She shrugged as she replied. "I don't know, but I feel great like I am bursting with energy."

"Well, we will have to figure it out later, for now the chakra I gave you should let you move faster, hit harder, heal and generally be more durable." Naruto said before turning to Diana and asking. "Now which way did Darkseid go? And where is the rest of the team?"

TBC...

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Okay, so I hope you enjoyed the chapter. Sorry to leave you with a cliffhanger there, but my crappy internet forced me to cut it there and upload right now or wait another day or two. I had like two and a half more pages for the proper ending, but somehow this feels better. Anyway, next chapter will at the very least conclude the fight with Darkseid and possibly this whole beginning arc of the story.

I already got plans for what Naruto does next, but I will talk about them another time. Hopefully I portrayed Darkseid in a realistic manner. I firmly believe that Superman should lose to him whenever they fight, simply because he is a god from beyond multiverse. Well, I actually have long list of reasons but that is the simplest one.

And to be clear, cause I get asked this in PM's for some reason. Naruto isn't at the level of his canon counterparts, whether War arc Six Paths Sage Mode Naruto, or End of Series Naruto. He is waaaaayy beyond them in power. DC comics is full of powerhouses and Naruto got beefed up by the guys who decided to send him along to the DC universe so he could keep up.

Anyway please leave a review, it gives me a feel for everyone's expectations and guidance on how I can improve the quality of my work, and myself as an author.

Till next time, Scarlet Out!


	4. Chapter 4: United miracles happen!

Pairing: Naruto/Supergirl/Wonder-Woman/Grail/Mera/Shay Veritas/Zatanna/Poison Ivy/Donna Troy/?

Disclaimer: I do not own the Naruto franchise or DC comics. I simply do this for fun and to improve myself as writer. I also get bored easily...but that's neither here nor there.

**A/N:** Okay, welcome to the fourth chapter of Sage of War. This chapter will conclude the fighting, and I really hope you guys will bare with me to the end. So, sorry for the delay. My computer crashed, my phone died and it took a while for me to find another laptop to begin the whole chapter from scratch. Someone is or was impersonating me on Webnovel dot com. And I could take all that, but life tried to kick me while I was down. My dad apparently had an extremely minor heart-attack that even he didn't notice, but it weakened his heart and now according to the doctors, he has less than 5 years to live.

And as if that wasn't bad enough, the thing that really put a halt on this chapter was the loss of someone I cared about. My bestfriend's little sister was brutally murdered a couple of weeks ago by her Ex, and well, I just wasn't in the right place to keep running with this or AUH Chapter 6 which I was working on at the time. I am sure everyone I usually keep in contact with via PM's noticed my silence, sorry guys but I needed time. I am back now.

Anyway, I finally decided to get back in the saddle and finish this chapter, and it was not easy. If its not a smooth as the other chapters, well...you now know why.

Now, I see a lot of people don't really seem to get how strong Darkseid actually is. To be clear he's actually stronger than Superman. In the New 52 comics, I believe it was Superman volume 3 issue No. 13, Clark was put in a machine created Dr. Shay Veritas that exerted a force equal to the mass of the planet Earth on himself, and he was basically benchpressing it for a whole week with only a single drop of sweat to show for all his exertion. In fact Dr. Veritas wanted to increase the pressure in order to push his limits but wanted his permission first, because she was afraid she might create a black hole if she added more mass to the machine. Luckily he said no.

Superman is literally strong enough to carry the planet, but can't physically do it because of its sheer size relative to him. Then in Justice League issue No. 23.1, which is a tale about Darkseid's New 52 origins. Darkseid was pursuing a New God named Kaiyo with the ability to create natural Boomtubes. She instinctively sought worlds that would give him trouble, and led Darkseid to numerous alternate versions of Superman, all of whom Darkseid managed to kill. The point is that Darkseid is above Superman in terms of power, and Superman is above Naruto. Darkseid was toying with them last chapter, this chapter you see a bit of his real power.

This doesn't not mean that Naruto cannot defeat either, if Batman beat Superman, Naruto can definitely find a way. Plus he is a godkiller in this fic, a hard counter to the powers of any god including Darkseid. So if Darkseid comes across as OP or conversely, if Naruto seems under powered, they aren't. Comic book Darkseid is just that much more power than Naruto.

The other thing was some of you were pissed that Naruto has a "Boss" now. Its an important plot point for the story down the road so I can't change it, but his Boss is very hands-off, and wont dictate much of anything in his life. They are there to make sure he doesn't abuse his new power, and they called themselves his "Boss", more to avoid revealing their identity anyway. So don't worry about it.

As for Naruto's performance in the previous chapter. Guys, that was him without using any chakra, his base form is capable of feats he would normally only be able to do with Sage mode active. The clones on the other had their power split 10,000 ways, so they were under performing. It does not in any mean Naruto is nerfed, how any of you could miss that is quite surprising actually.

Now to reply to some reviews, and holy shit you guys. A 131 was the largest number of reviews I've ever had for a single chapter. Thank! Thank! Thank!

**ImGoingForAWalk:** Tell me what you think of him after this chapter.

**Phenomenal Ultra Instinct:** Damn, your reviews always make sweat bullets with how scary accurate you are.

**Carlosxvx:** He was in base form the whole time, completely unable to use his chakra, until after he pretty much died and came back to life. The clones were also weaker due to initially having their chakra split 10,000 ways. This chapter he is up to full power, some aspects of his buffs, show.

**XenoLucifer:** Kaguya and Darkseid have a couple of similar powers that basically neutralize each other, if she could make a dimension and collapse it on him, Comicbook Darkseid would simply boomtube out of it. If Darkseid dropped her in the Omega Sanction, she would likely be able to open her own portal out. Also, if you claim her All-killing Ash Bone or her Expansive Truth Seeking Ball can kill him, then I can equally claim his Omega Effect and Erosion blasts can do the same to her. They are both divine attacks, unlike Kaguya we've actually scene Darkseid kill other gods with his powers. I am not even going to bring up his telepathy, telekinesis and other bullshit powers. The difference in scale of their divinity is significant, Darkseid is to begin with a god from beyond the multiverse and the space-time continuum itself. Kaguya is just an alien goddess who at best can hop around the universe.

**Yuuchi Yosamu:** I never even thought about that until you mentioned it, I haven't really read any of Third Fangs work in several years now, but I can see how he might have had an influence on me. Especially since I was an avid reader of his works back in 2011-2012.

**helrio uzugaku:** Thanks. I honestly want to do my own thing, but I am sure some similarities between Campioneverse godslayers and the way Kama works in the comics will pop up. For now, he can absorb divine powers and weaken gods/strengthen himself. The other major thing as the story progresses, will be his ability undo some the curses and stupid shit different pantheons have done to humans over the years.

**Spark681:** Mera's new abilities will be important to the upcoming chapters.

**NarutoxYugao:** I aim to please, and don't worry, I am Sir. I am glad you liked that scene, some reviewers were not too happy with a more vulnerable Wonder Woman at the end there, but it felt right to me. I hope this chapter lives up to your expectations.

**Piouspoppy41355:** You are onto something there. The Superman theory in Doomsday Clock, might just become the Naruto theory.

**Adam2point4:** The way I view it, is that Darkseid's own divine energy acts as a protective field around his body. Otherwise anyone with a blade sharpened to an edge that was nanometers thick would be able to just stab him to death with impunity, heaven forbid they use an actual monomolecular blade. I never said that Superman could move quadrillions of times the speed of light, and Naruto actually does have a limit to how much sage energy he can harness. Though on Earth, what constitutes nature energy is not quite the same as in the Elemental Nations.

**dammyd:** There are good reasons why Naruto should not lead the League.

**Exodus12345:** Naruto can't actually curbstomp Darkseid, at least he wont be able to do so very long time. But that doesn't mean he can't win against Darkseid. I am not sure if it will be more lighthearted, because I try to model my stories on life. The characters will all have their ups and downs, the Naruto in AUH is going through a tough time, but things will get better for him. This Naruto pretty much died in the last chapter, the Justice League wins in this one. I also believe in mutual love, just because I gave him a harem of ladies from the DC universe I like, doesn't mean their relationships wont be based on love and trust.

Okay that is enough reviews for now, you all came here for the story. I really hope you enjoy it and please remember to leave a review at the end...

* * *

**Chapter 4: United miracles happen!**

"_Darkseid lost because of the same reason all gods I've fought over the long years lose. Arrogance!_

_He was stronger, more powerful, crueler and the one on the offensive. He shouldn't have lost, not when his punches could erase continents if he wished. No he toyed with us, and we used that to our advantage, striking a blow that he would never forget. It was the day when ants felled a giant."_

— **Naruto Uzumaki** about **Darkseid**, during the invasion.

**oOo**

**Remnant's of Metropolis Harbor, Metropolis...**

"**I must commend you for your survival mortal. Most, simply turn to ashes after getting hit by my Omega Beams, and even fewer come back for more after surviving. Tell me, what is your name?"** Darkseid asked the blond human before, who had once again shown up to fight him, and this time all alone. The New God did not say it, and he would've rather died than admit it, but he felt a smidgen of respect for the mortal. Not only had he somehow regenerated from a rather thorough attempt by Darkseid at incinerating him, he had actually come back stronger.

The human eyed him warily but without true fear. It was clear that he respected the threat that Darkseid represented, yet was obviously also unwilling to back down from this fight. It was an impressive disposition for a mortal to have, perhaps even something he would have considered an admirable quality, if not for the fact it was also very annoying. Darkseid didn't have time to deal with human trash, he needed to find his daughter quickly.

Grail's mother, the Amazon assassin Myrina Black, had trained her well and she had become quite skilled at hiding her presence from him. It wouldn't stop him from finding her of course, he was the master of the Omega Effect, and he shared a unique bond with Grail who had inherited it. It was simply impossible for either of them to not instinctively be aware of each others presences when in the same universe, let alone on the same planet.

The only problem was actually pinpointing her location now that they were on the same world. All Darkseid had was a general sense that she was on the planet, finding her exact position was something he and his forces had to do manually. Darkseid knew he would've have felt it if Grail fled off world, and that was the only reason he was even willing to indulge this brave but foolish mortal's attempts to draw his attention.

"My name is Sage." The young one quickly responded, before immediately shifting into a combat stance. It was as clear an invitation as any for them to begin their battle, apparently this Sage wasn't one to banter like most of the champions on the other Earth's he had visited. Furthermore, after their previous scuffle, Darkseid had come to acknowledge the mortal's martial combat skills. It was for these reasons alone that Darkseid decided to take things slightly more seriously than last time. After all, Sage was stronger than before and had already proven himself to be a tricky opponent.

"**Very well, let us begin."** Darkseid acknowledged, in a tone that might have been mistaken for resignation. A single motion of his hands and all his remaining Parademons resumed their harvesting duties with orders to ignore this battle, and not interfere unless he commanded it. The monstrous creatures immediately obeyed, flying off to round up humans.

For a tense few seconds, neither of them moved so much as inch, as they sized each other up. Sage in his favored fighting stance (Frog Kata), and Darkseid with his arms folded behind his back, a distance of less than 20 meters between them. Then the New God exploded into action.

Responding to his will, the Omega Effect in his very soul immediately pooled behind his eyes, letting them brighten to a blinding luminosity before being unleashed. His crimson Omega Beams readied to give this so called Sage, another lesson in the art of agony. Had anyone else been there and been paying attention to his face, they would've have noted the evil smile Darkseid now bore.

The response from the human was instant, Sage burst into motion with his impressive speed for a mortal without access to the Speedforce, hoping to get in close before he was incinerated again. Unfortunately he was only fast for a human, Darkseid easily tracked his progress with his vision, his eyes flashing six times as they unleashed 12 hellish beams of his deadly Omega Effect. All 12 of the Omega Beams easily locking onto Sage and striking independently of each other from different angles.

It was a simple but efficient tactic, an omni-directional attack, that struck down his target at close to the speed of light in a pincer maneuver. The attack was utterly unavoidable, and one that had served him well against other versions of the Justice League. Not even the other iterations of the Amazon princess who were all notoriously skilled at deflecting attacks with their divine bracelets, were been able to walk away unscathed from it.

That each beam was powerful enough to hurt fully powered Kryptonians and other gods, meant that most beings could not even hope to take it head on. However Darkseid quickly learned that Sage was not most beings.

Sage stopped on a dime, as the Omega Beams surrounded him. His form lit up in golden flame-like energy even as a pitch black sphere suddenly appeared in his outstretched right hand, while eight more of the spheres materialized and floated lazily behind his back in a perfect circle. Strange markings also began to cover the mortal, particularly Sage's right arm, giving of both a feeling of familiarity and the unknown.

As soon as he saw them, Darkseid had an intensely bad feeling about those spheres, he recognized them as not being normal, as well as something a human should not possess. These feelings were proven correct almost immediately, when the sphere in Sage's hand shifted into a battle staff as dark as the abyss, which the blond then twirled around himself at blinding speeds.

The staff spun like a buzz saw, only at speeds that were easily approaching that of light itself. Then at just the right moment, as if knowing exactly what angles the Omega Beams would converge at, Sage used the edges of the staff to intercept all 12 Omega Beams. To Darkseid, as he watched it happen in slow motion, it was as if Sage was simply guiding his staff to where it needed to be, before the Beams even hit, making their unpredictable random movements pointless. _**'Did have some kind of precognition?'**_

Even more shocking was the fact that normally when his Omega Beams hit something, they either exploded or completely incinerated whatever they touched, unless he willed them to perform other exotic tasks. The only exceptions to this, as far as he was aware, were artifacts and weapons imbued with powerful magical or divinity. The bracelets worn by the Amazon warrior women used for deflecting attacks away from them were one good example, divine artifacts made from Athena's Aegis shield. The Trident granted to the Atlantean King was another, made by Hephaestus's forge, and gifted to the first King of Atlantis by Poseidon in the distant past.

What Darkseid was witnessed happening at that moment however, was neither incineration, explosion nor a form of deflection. Instead, it was like his Omega Beams were simply erased from existence upon making contact with that Black Weapon. To be more precise, it was like they were absorbed or sucked out of reality, upon making contact with the pitch black sphere – turned staff. His Omega Beams were gone, as if sucked into a black hole, and his connection to them vanished. Whatever they were, those spheres were far from normal, and he made a mental note to avoid them at all cost.

Despite the strange turn of events, the staff clearly had a limit as to how much it could absorb. Darkseid could clearly see the white vein-like patterns that appeared along the length of the battle staff, like cracks and fractures in an old wall. They had only appeared after it finished absorbing all the Omega Beams, so rightly assumed that the black weapon could only contain a limited amount of power. It was still an impressive feat considering they absorbed his power.

All these observations and thoughts flashed through Darkseid's mind in pico-seconds, and were tossed aside as Sage barely finished absorbing the Omega Beams before spinning on his heel and throwing the battle staff at Darkseid like a Javelin. Rather than batting the clearly unstable weapon aside or shooting it down with his Omega Beams, Darkseid, with a thought and a small hand gesture stopped the projectile in midair. It was rare for him to use his telekinesis in battle but he was glad he did, because in the next instant the battle staff exploded with blinding white energy. Likely a combination of the unprocessed remnants of his Omega effect and Sage's strange life-force based energy.

The explosion had been bright enough to temporarily blind him, and was barely over, with his vision still recovering from the improvised attack, when Sage struck. The young warrior blitz through the dust cloud from the explosion, closing the distance between them in the blink of an eye. Still recovering Darkseid, didn't even have time to fire another Omega Beam, so he focused his power into left hand, making it glow brilliant crimson with the Omega Effect and then an ethereal white, before he punched where he sensed Sage to be.

**BOOOOOOOOMM!**

The air crackled with thunder, dust and arcs of lightning. Heat and overpressure scattering and pulping everything in his vicinity. Even the very ground beneath his feet shimmered like glass as it was flash incinerated and turned to lava. Everything else was simply destroy, everything but Sage.

The stubborn human appeared completely unharmed, his right arm which had strange black flame-like markings scrawled all across it, was easily holding back Darkseid's punch much to the New God's shock. _**'What?'**_

"**That's impossible."** The tyrant couldn't help but whisper, truly baffled for once at what he was witnessing. True, he still wasn't taking this fight as seriously as he could've, but regardless of that fact, his last punch was killing move. Darkseid already felt like his pride was stained by the fact that Sage had somehow survived getting blasted by his Omega Beams for nearly ten minutes, it was something he could not tolerate. So he had intended to rectify that failure all at once by killing him where he stood, with that last punch. Only instead of vaporizing or even hurting Sage with the blow, his left arm felt...strangely weak.

VvV

"**That's impossible!"** He heard Darkseid whisper in shock, well...it was a whisper for Darkseid, but to Naruto's ears it sounded like a bellow. That said, he didn't completely disagree.

Simply catching Darkseid's punch was something he had done on instinct when the Lord of Apokolips correctly deduced his plan of attack and countered with a lethal blow of his own, at speeds Naruto had no hope of dodging. Naruto had really just panicked in that moment and reached out to catch the punch. To his surprise, instead of his entire arm being turned to pulp, he actually stopped Darkseid's attack in its tracks. Naruto knew he was strong but he certainly wasn't that strong.

Furthermore, he could feel himself getting stronger as he held the gods arm at bay. It was only by a small amount, but it was still very obvious to his senses that he was somehow absorbing Darkseid's power and increasing his own in the process. All in all, it was a mere drop in the bucket when compared to the oceans Darkseid still had for his reserves, but it made his job easier.

After meeting up with the others, they had come up with a simple plan,their primary object was to keep Darkseid busy until Batman got back to Earth with Superman. Of course if they could somehow kill the New God, then they were to do everything in their power to fulfill that goal. Unfortunately the whole team knew that it was highly unlikely any of them would be able to kill the Apokoliptan tyrant. So the next best thing, as per Batman's suggestion, was to simply blind Darkseid using Aquaman's trident and Wonder Woman's sword. Those were the only weapons Darkseid had actively avoided up until now, so it was logical to conclude that they could harm him somehow.

In hindsight, it was almost obvious that blinding the god was the strategy they should have employed from the very beginning. Since he had appeared, Darkseid had clearly shown that he favored using his Omega Beams above all other abilities, whenever he attacked. The fact that his Omega Beam could lock onto a target and pursue them independently of his actions, as well as avoid obstacles by making sharp corners around them, made the attack ludicrously dangerous. Throw in the fact that they had enough power to harm a Kryptonian, and it simply became critical that they blind him as soon as possible.

Darkseid's Omega Beams were simply too dangerous for any of them to continue this fight without taking them from him. Only Naruto, Wonder Woman and Flash really stood a chance at avoiding or deflecting the powerful "eye beams of doom" as Green Lantern called them, so Naruto had volunteered to face Darkseid alone as a distraction. He only needed to keep the New God's attention long enough for the others to catch him in a surprise attack, but they had to wait for the perfect moment or it could really end badly-.

The right hook came like a bolt of lightning from seemingly out of nowhere, shocking Naruto out of his thoughts. Had he stayed in the same position, he would've had every bone in his body around the point of impact shattered in an instant. It was by a hairsbreadth that he escaped when replaced himself with a log via the **Replacement Technique**.

Sawdust and splinters sprinkled the air around the place he just stood in, while Naruto reappeared a dozen meters away from Darkseid. _'That's what I get for daydreaming during a fight.'_ He thought in self-admonishment. Leaping backwards and into the air, Naruto drew a Flying Thunder-god kunai with his left hand, while in his right he formed a **Lava Release: Rasenshuriken!**

Wrapping the kunai in lightning, Naruto threw it at Darkseid face, to which the god mockingly tilted his head just enough to let it shoot past him, a mistake Darkseid would soon regret. Naruto reared his arm back to throw the Rasenshuriken at Darkseid, but the god's eyes flared to life and fired a blast of his Omega Beams straight at Naruto, who still had his hand extended behind him. It was clear he intended to detonate Rasenshuriken while it was still in Naruto's hand, but his actions were already too late.

At that exact moment, a clone hidden behind some nearby debris to observe the fight, teleported to the kunai that was buried in the ground behind Darkseid. The Lord of Apokolips had no chance to even react to the second Naruto as soon as he appeared, before the clone stepped forward and placed its hand on his back...and then time became meaningless.

From Naruto's perception, in which time and the world around him slowed to an almost standstill, the Omega Beams were mere centimeters from his face and, all but ready to vaporize him again. That was when he muttered. **"Flying Thunder-god: Round Robin!"**

VvV

The world shifted violently, twisting in a way that was unnatural before Darkseid found that he had somehow switched places with the original Sage. His own Omega Beams where mere inches from his face, and before he could even attempt to react to this, the clone of Sage behind him – which had teleported along with him – suddenly exploded. The explosion itself was utterly ineffective, he didn't even feel it. The only problem was that original Sage had been in midair when they switched places, so Darkseid now found himself in the air, and the transition was too sudden for him to activate his power of flight before the explosion occurred.

The end result of this was that, while the exploding clone had not harmed him in any way, it still pushed him forward and straight into the Omega Beams, preventing him from reacting at all. Darkseid quickly found himself regretting overloading his Omega Beams with enough power to wreck a moon as he was literally blasted away at supersonic speeds, to painful effect. And to add insult to injury, Sage slammed the ball of revolving lava-like energy right into his back, sending him flying in of into the distance where it detonated with enough power erase entire mountain ranges.

Darkseid's body was flung far from the city they had been fighting in and he came crashing down in forest-like area, forming a massive crater. He was barely on his feet before Sage was upon, him again. The human warrior's right hand turned pitch black while glowing golden-white flames surrounded it, which he drove in a vicious hook into Darkseid cheek making the god stumble backwards. The sheer impact of the blow igniting the forest and every living creature within it.

_**'That had hurt, how had this mortal hurt me!'**_ Darkseid wondered in shock, he knew Superman could hurt him seeing as the Man of Steel had strength that nearly rivaled his own own world-breaking power. Wonder Woman and her weapons were empowered by the Gods of Earth, who though living within the 3rd dimension, were still gods and thus she could do something similar. Even the Speedforce conduit and the Green Lantern corp member could under some very unlikely circumstances have hurt him, simply due to wielding two of the primordial forces of the universe. _**'But this mortal, this Sage. How had he hurt me, this bears investigation.'**_

VvV

Nature was on fire around him, and Naruto felt a pit of regret well up in his stomach for his actions. It couldn't be helped, he was a Sage and he could literally sense the animals and trees dying around him after hitting Darkseid as hard as he just had. His connection to nature made it impossible for him to ignore it, but he couldn't afford to hold back anymore. Not even for a second, especially now that they were clear of the city.

_'Please bear with it a little longer. Darkseid intends to destroy the world, I can't afford to hold back against him.'_ He thought out, in a manner akin to a prayer to nature. He didn't expect an answer though.

_**'Then let us help.'**_

He knew not from where the words came and he no time to dwell on it because he was immediately hit with retaliatory uppercut, hard enough to shoot straight into the stratosphere by Darkseid. His vision exploded in pinpricks and stars as he fought desperately, not to black out, and almost religious ignored the pain of his aching jaw. The last thing he had seen was a look on the New God's face that clearly said, 'he was done playing around', and judging by how high up they were, Darkseid clearly meant it.

It was only for second, but he still blacked out as he flew upwards, thankfully he woke up right away. His jaw ached from Darkseid's attack, clearly fractured but his regeneration was already taking care of it. All in all, it was a miracle his head was still attached to his body after that uppercut. Looking down towards where his sensory powers told him Darkseid was in pursuit of him, Naruto flipped over to face the god and prepared to activate his flight powers in order to slow himself to a stop, but then he heard it again.

_**'Let us help.'**_

This time there was a nudge, an offering of some kind of power, as something waited for him to accept. With all the craziness of his life recently, Naruto did not even hesitate to accept the offer with the simple thought of. _'Fine.'_ He needed all the help he could get after all, and wasn't thinking too hard about where this new power was coming from, mostly because it didn't feel evil to his senses.

What he didn't expect however, was for his upwards motion to instantly stop, and to find himself floating in place as his body was enveloped in a field of strange...energy. It wasn't anything he was familiar with, and yet, it was unquestionably nature energy of some sort. In his mind a name popped up..._**the White**_.

Naruto didn't dwell on this because Darkseid, who was hot in pursuit, suddenly fired half a dozen Omega Beams at him. In response, Naruto intended to use his remaining Truth Seeking Balls to absorb the blasts, so far each had been shown to be able to take up to 12 individual eye beams before they were dangerous overloaded and exploded. However, it all proved unnecessary.

At speeds that were very blatantly physics defying, dark clouds rapidly gathered in the air above him, before multiple lightning bolts suddenly shot down at unnaturally fast speeds and struck down at each of the Omega Beams as if predicting their paths.

With the most harmful attacks out of the way, Naruto actively called upon the power of the Storm while raising his right arm above him. A bolt of pure white plasma flashed across the sky and struck his raised hand, where he mixed it with his chakra and formed a **Lightning Release: Rasenshuriken**. Naruto then merely _'thought'_ about attacking Darkseid and whatever **'the White'** was, the energy acted intuitively to his thoughts, accelerating him straight down at the god on a clear attack vector, before either of them could fully react to the other.

Darkseid raised his hands to grab at Naruto's neck, before the ninja could slam the attack into his face but another bolt of lightning slammed into the gods eyes, momentarily blinding him. It was an opportunity Naruto did not waste, as he flew around the outstretched arm and slammed the new kind of Rasenshuriken into Darkseid's unguarded chest, blasting him straight downwards, into the ocean below.

However Darkseid wasn't a being that was felled so easily.

VvV

Darkseid felt rage begin to boil in his pitch black soul as the mortal, known as Sage, began to give him trouble. Sage was rapidly shifting from a mere curiosity thanks to his presence and unique powers, to an irritation that needed to be stamped out. Defeating the mortal was easy enough, the gap between Sage and Darkseid's own power, was like the difference between heaven and earth. The problem was that the actual Earth seemed to want to weigh in on this private battle.

The Apokoliptan New God, was more than familiar with Elementals due to encountering them on other Earths. He already had special individuals, designed to deal with them. Which was why he knew perfectly well, what a wielder of **'the White'** was capable. This brat was inexperienced and he clearly wasn't channeling as much of the power of the sky, as his counterpart on other Earths had shown themselves to be capable of.

But that did not change the fact that Sage had spontaneously gained access to this power, nor the fact that even before that the human had somehow stopped a full power punch from Darkseid, literally weakening the god and sapping his divinity. There were many other powers he had shown before that, tricks that while all impressive were generated by the blond's own life-force powers. Those last two powers however, were different, one was not yet understood by Darkseid and the other came from nature itself, in order to help the hero called Sage. He supposed it was fitting considering the hero's name.

Despite falling towards the sea below, Darkseid smirked when the sky above lit up in a crimson explosion. One of the Omega Beams he had fired earlier had looped around Sage, and struck the blond annoyance in the back while he was distracted with his own attack again Darkseid. The mortal was blasted down towards the murky ocean waters where he quickly joined Darkseid.

_**'If **_**'the White'**_** was giving the blond its energy, then forcing him into the water would naturally take away the power offered to him by the Sky.'**_So it was with a smile than Darkseid swam towards Sage at speeds that would cause global Tsunamis and kill any nearby fish for hundreds of leagues, before planting his fist in the hero's stomach. A smile that would not last long.

VvV

Naruto doubled over in agonizing pain as Darkseid appeared out of nowhere and punched him in the torso. He could feel his bones shattering throughout his chest cavity, even as his intestines were pulped and his lungs collapsed. A second blow to the right cheek knocked out one of his incisor and fractured his jaw, before a third shattered his nose and cheek bones, leaking his life blood into the ocean. What pissed him off most as he shot backwards through the murky waters was that Darkseid had the temerity to pluck up his tooth which floated freely in the ocean water after it was knocked out of his mouth, keeping it as a souvenir or something.

For a moment Naruto literally found himself seeing red, as unbridled _Rage_ filled his being. It was animalistic, the type of rage you expect from a cornered, desperate and badly wounded beast with nowhere to run. So enraged was he, the he did not even note the small amount of pressure filling his mouth as his missing incisor was quickly replaced, nor how the cartilage in his nose promptly fixed itself...faster than it ever had in the past, even with Kurama's help. He did however note the rest of his shattered bones begin to repair themselves.

It was like his natural regeneration was turned up to eleven, all damage done by Darkseid brief assault rapidly repairing itself. A red mystical glow surrounded the wounded areas, before regenerating them. Naruto was so shocked by this that he snapped out of his rage, and promptly realized that he wasn't choking on the water he had been forced to inhale.

He already knew he could hold his breath for incredible amounts of time, to the point that he didn't really need to breath whenever he entered uninhabitable environments. His chakra took over, suspending the respiration process while directly supplying him with the energy he needed to survive. However this was clearly something different, when you inhaled water into your lungs it was only natural to choke and try and cough it out. Yet he wasn't choking nor had he stopped breathing, in fact it was the complete opposite, he could breath just fine underwater.

Not only that, Naruto felt himself getting even stronger, the very water was giving him strength somehow, he quickly realized. A calming blue field of energy appearing his minds eye and joining the animalistic red, the thunderous white, the earthy brown and the vibrant green. Each color seemed to be battling each other for dominance, with blue currently taking center stage. Meanwhile his chakra and the overly abundant purple themed natural energy here on Earth, that Madam Xanadu had called magic tried to wrestle these other forces into some semblance of balance. In the heat of battle, Naruto hadn't even noticed he had absorbed so much of the different nature energies.

With all this natural energy out of balance, it was a miracle he could even use Six Paths Sage Mode, and Naruto really didn't have time to focus on balancing his internal energies either, or his growing migraine, not with Darkseid right in front of him. The aforementioned tyrant who had simply stopped his assault to observe him in clear fascination as he healed, decided to finally speak up despite being underwater. **"Is that all you have human?"** He asked.

Darkseid's very words created a shockwave of power that physically pushed the water away from them for over a mile in every direction. Naruto was quickly forced to activate the flight ability that came with the White, or he would have risked falling to the bedrock of the ocean itself, after the water parted around him and Darkseid.

The words were a challenge had used were a challenge, Naruto knew the evil god was merely baiting him to see if he had any more surprises for him. Naruto had thousands, but most were still ineffective against the deity. However these new powers were covering for his weaknesses, whenever his own natural powers fell short, and more importantly Darkseid was still weakening. He doubted the New God even realized it yet due to the sheer amount of power he had at his disposal...that or his arrogance, but he was weakening so long as he remained in Naruto's presence.

_'Keep it up you bastard! The longer you delay this, the easier it will be for the others.'_ Naruto thought silently with grimace, before charging in for another attack.

VvV

**Apokolips, DeSaad's lab...**

"The Parademon hives on Earth were ill equipped to reprocess his flesh, but what pleasure it's been to cut it and cut it, again and again." Said Apokolips's chief scientist and torturer in pure glee, as he manipulated the interface for one of his machines, resulting in scalpel-like blades made of hellish red light, begin stabbing and dissecting pieces of the Kryptonian's flesh over and over again.

Steppenwolf understood what his colleague was feeling, as New Gods, it rubbed them the wrong way that a being like Superman could even exist. A mortal whose power exceeded all of theirs, with the exception of Apokolips' Lord and, Master Darkseid. They completely despised Superman for this simple fact, and if it were up to him, Steppenwolf would simply have had the Kryptonian killed. Unfortunately their Lord had decided to turn him into a weapon, to be used in the coming war against Earth 2. A Superman to fight another Superman, Darkseid's idea of joke.

Though he didn't like it, Steppenwolf was a loyal servant of Darkseid, thus he felt it prudent to remind his colleague of their duty, and the rules Darkseid had laid down long ago. "Do not acknowledge pleasure DeSaad, it is forbidden. The Kryptonian was not brought here for you. He was brought here to become a new breed of soldier, one who will prove vital in the search for the daughter of Darkseid and the fall of the other Earth."

DeSaad grimaced for a moment, at the reminder of the ancient law, of pleasure being forbidden on Apokolips. Darkseid hated it when anyone showed any form of joy on Apokolips, laughter was instant grounds for execution via Omega Beams. With sigh DeSaad replied. "Our master will not stop until she is found, Steppenwolf."

"Then neither shall we. All hail Darkseid!" Apokolips's general spoke, reaffirming his loyalty, while thinking about his Master's almost frantic search for his daughter. He knew better than to think it was out of love or devotion, but Darkseid was very obviously obsessed with finding his wayward child. And it was their duty to see that their Lord succeeded.

"All hail Darkseid!" DeSaad responded in agreement.

Suddenly Steppenwolf's battle instincts flared to life, and with an impressively swift response, he raised his massive Electro-axe into the air and skillfully deflected multiple flying knives meant to assassinate him and DeSaad. Shocked and enraged that someone dared try assassinate him, the Apokolips's military general, Steppenwolf barely had time to look up in the direction of his assailant before they disappeared. The assassins who was crouching upside down, on ceiling of the Lab vanished from sight, the moment Steppenwolf looked at him, disappearing in flicker of golden light.

Then before the general could even process what he had witnessed and call for a search team to capture the assassin, the killer reappeared right next to him, already in the middle of an attack. A ball of golden energy had bloomed in the assassins hand as he screamed. "**Rasengan!**" And the next thing Steppenwolf knew, the ball of energy was being slammed into his unprotected side.

Steppenwolf found himself blasted through a computer terminal and then through a nearby wall as the energy attack detonated. By the time he tumbled to a stop, his armor was ruined, with a gaping hole in his side, meanwhile his whole body was protesting in agony from the violent assault on his person.

Still, like a good soldier he rolled to his feet and prepared to fight, crouching low with his axe at the ready. He didn't have to wait too long either. Steppenwolf barely managed to bring his weapon in front of him, in time to block a knee to the face with the flat side of his axe. The impact forcing him to take a step back, where he spun on his heel and retaliated with a vicious horizontal swing to behead the fool that had attacked him. Unfortunately the assassin was very nimble and ducked under the blow, and then sidestepped the follow up a diagonal slash meant to cleave him from his right shoulder to his left hip. To call the assassin fast was an understatement, worse yet he was flexible and acrobatic, flowing around Steppenwolf's attacks like water. Steppenwolf had to begrudgingly give him or her, his respect.

Then things began to turn for the worst as a barehanded punch to the gut forced the air out of his lungs and had him doubling over in pain. An elbow right afterwards, slammed into his jaw knocking a tooth loose while he was bent over. Steppenwolf retaliated with a mule kick to the chest that was calmly sidestepped, before the assassin swept his remaining foot, out from under him. Steppenwolf quickly found himself the victim of gravity as he crashed into the ground, back first.

It was the perfect opportunity for the assassin to go in for the kill or at least cause more damage to Steppenwolf's being. Not that the Apokoliptan general had any intention of making it easy for the assassin. Instead the assassin backed off, as if intending to prolong the fight.

Steppenwolf found himself feeling suspicious of this, but he was also a military general and unwilling to look a gift horse in the mouth. If the assassin wanted to prolong things and risk Steppenwolf receiving reinforcements, then the general was more than happy to play along. Someone would hear the racket this fight was causing soon and come to investigate.

Getting back to his feet with his Electro-axe in hand, Steppenwolf took a moment to memorize the assassins features. He, for the assassin was definitely male, looked familiar. Clearly a human, based off of the primitive garb that their kind called clothes and well built. He had blond hair, blue eyes, whisker-like marks on each cheek and a solid figure. Suddenly a memory of the latest recordings that he had been shown of the invasion on Earth sprung to mind, and he recalled where he had seen this creature.

This was one of the defenders of Earth that had been fighting against Darkseid, it explained why his attacks and strength was so high for a human. Pushing all other thoughts save those of the battle before him to the side, Steppenwolf charged with a roar before raising his axe high and swinging down. The assassin sidestepped and snapped a kick into Steppenwolf's side, but the general luckily blocked it with his forearm. Unfortunately their was enough force behind the blow to send him skidding on his feet sideways.

Steppenwolf had barely stopped his backwards movement before the assassin was on him, it was out of pure reflexes that he swung his axe at the assassin's neck. Unfortunately, to his amazement and horror the assassin caught the handle of the blade and held it perfectly still, before saying in a tone of mockery. "It seems you are not quite up to Darkseid's level of power. He's pretty strong, you're a poor joke."

When the kick came their was no way to block and Steppenwolf found his body blasted backwards where he bounced and rolled across the harsh Apokoliptan terrain before coming to a stop. Everything hurt, and though it wasn't quite as bad as the few times he had had the misfortune of being disciplined by Darkseid or bearing the brunt of Calbak's wrath, the pain of having his ribs shattered was still pretty agonizing. So much so, that he had even let go of his trusted Electro-axe which was resting firmly in the hands of the assassin, who after following him, now stood a few meters away, clearly waiting for Steppenwolf to get back on his feet.

Finally after rising to his feet, Steppenwolf asked in a wary voice. "Who are you assassin?"

This seemed to get a smirk out of his blond assailant who replied while twirling the massive axe in his hands as if it was as light as a feather. "Wrong question? What you should really be asking, is whether you can get past me before my friends finish tearing the answers we want out of you buddy with the messed up face back there."

"DeSaad!" Steppenwolf cried in realization this assassin was merely toying with him, in order to draw more attention to their battle and give his allies more time to extract valuable information from his fellow New God. His companion would be even more helpless against opponents of this caliber, seeing as DeSaad was not a soldier. Steppenwolf knew he had to do something, but he had no idea what and the assassin had already taken his favored weapon from him.

Something must have shown on his face, for the human who had previously looked almost angelic, suddenly gave a positively devilish smirk as he said. "That's the look of panic I want. Now come here little god, I want the world to hear you scream."

It was going to be a very bad day for both Steppenwolf and DeSaad.

VvV

**Several hundred miles off the coast of Metropolis...**

Naruto felt the bones in his right arm crumble, and his muscles turn into mush as he blocked Darkseid's punch after failing to properly dodge. There wasn't much he could do to avoid it after Darkseid managed to pin him at the bottom of the sea floor. However despite the pain, he didn't worry about his injuries. This was not the first or second time Darkseid had all but pulverized a section of his body. The animalistic power of the strange red energy accelerated his regenerative healing, weaving bone, flesh and blood back together in micro-seconds.

Unknown to him, their was a lot more that the energy field known as **'the Red'** could do, but Naruto was subconsciously using it to accelerate the repair of his body at a rate almost as fast as it was being torn apart, thanks to the sheer brutality of the fight. Not to mention that, while his back was literally pressed against the seabed, he was simultaneously channeling energy from **'the Melt'**, another aspect of Earth's Nature energy tied specifically to Land, making his body tougher than diamond. It was all subconscious, just like how with **'the Clear/Blue'** he had been able to breathe under water and manipulate the water in order to swim through it quickly, or to use **'the White'** in order to fly and call down the lightning at will. And though he had yet to use **'the Green'**, he instinctively knew that it could at the very least accelerate the growth plants.

With so many different forms of energy flowing into his body, it was a workout in and of itself for him to balance it all with his own vast chakra reserves. Unfortunately, up to this point Naruto hadn't succeeded at all, and as result Darkseid had given him a thrashing. His body was barely keeping up with the speed at which the New God had been tearing him apart. Playtime was long since over, and Darkseid was actively trying to kill him.

**The Red** worked overtime to keep him alive, but blood, teeth, bone fragments and bits of flesh filled the deep ocean waters, as Naruto did his best to dodge, parry and block his way through the New God's assault. Punches thundered even under the water, scattering tens of thousands of cubic meters of ocean water in shockwaves, before it returned to cover them again in its crushing depths. Naruto painfully endured it all, focusing solely on weakening the self-proclaimed God of Evil, while keeping Darkseid in the midst of his fury from noticing the drain on his divine power. And then it happened.

Perhaps it was one punch too many to the noggin, perhaps Naruto simply gave in to the infamous Uzumaki temper that had been stoked by the animalistic rage of the Red, or perhaps he simply stopped trying to balance and control all the different forms energy his body now housed. It might have even been something as simple as his desire to simply protect his new found friends, or the fault of the divine energy he had been leaching from the god, like an over-sized vampiric parasite.

In the end Naruto himself had no idea what triggered it, all he remembered was the moment when all the pieces came crashing together. A sinking feeling in the depths of his gut, as all the energies within him including everything he had absorbed from Darkseid, threatened to crush his very soul and drag him over the precipice. Instead, at that moment when he felt all was lost, it all just clicked into place like the clockwork of a sophisticated timepiece, and something new was born within him.

The world seemed to grow deathly still, waiting in anticipation of what was about to occur as time seemed to all but stop. Then the water surrounding his form exploded off of him with enough force to free himself of Darkseid, his power lashing out with the brilliance and violence of a new star being born, forcing everything in a five kilometer radius to simply evaporate, save for Darkseid.

Above the god and godkiller's head a truly colossal lightning storm began to form, and beneath their feet a new sea was birthed, one made of molten lava. It was an oddly picturesque scene, as Darkseid and Naruto hovered in the air face to face, a literal wall of ocean water rushing in towards them to fill the void Naruto had created as his powers took on a new form. Sky-fire flashed above and the boiling ichor of the planet bubbled below, the incoming waves churned and gale force winds roared their reply, yet the two divine beings said nothing. For just a moment there was peace between the two, but it would not meant to last, this was just the eye of the storm after all.

Darkseid raised his hand, literally at the speed of light, to intercept the punch when the fight suddenly resumed. The force of impact so overwhelming that he was actually forced back, and the lava-like seabed below them exploded into an enormously deep crater. Before the god could retaliate, Naruto delivered a kick to his chin using Hard-fist taijutsu technique's Maito Gai himself had drilled into him with the help of Rock Lee, during the war. Darkseid shot up into the atmosphere with Naruto hot on his heels.

Naruto's arms moved in a series of extremely precise rapid fire punches as he unleashed, Gai-sensei's favored **Morning Peacock technique**...or rather he utilized the principle behind it to make something new and even more devastating in this situation.

**Morning Peacock**, **Daytime Tiger** and **Evening Elephant** all had the same underlying principle, in that the technique's were basically just a punch. A super fast, super precise punch.

Morning Peacock was a series of punches at low hyper-sonic speeds that ignited the atmosphere, generating and accelerating balls of plasma at a target in the form of fireballs. What made it crazy was the fact that it was just a bunch of very precise punches, without any chakra in them. Daytime Tiger was an even faster punch, but instead of igniting the air in fireballs, it was a wide area attack that somehow displaced a massive amount of air and crushed the enemy with pure pressure exerted on everything in its area of effect. Evening Elephant, was simply a super refined version of Daytime Tiger, focusing and concentrating all that displaced air and pressure on a very narrow target area, again without igniting the atmosphere.

Maito Gai, had demonstrated all three techniques during the war, and explained the theory behind the first two to him in detail from his wheelchair, during Naruto's training against Madara. Naruto had never mastered these technique, not like Rock Lee who was being trained to inherit all of Maito Gai's knowledge, but then he had never really had to. Naruto already had physical strength that was a match for the Juubi Jinchuuriki, and his speed exceeded anything the 8 Gates could grant him aside from if he used the Gate of Death, and even then Naruto was faster. No, it was the sheer precision and mastery of the taijutsu techniques themselves which Gai passed on to him, allowing him to use the full potential of his speed, strength and durability.

That said, Naruto had still picked up things here and there, and he was well known for using his creativity to apply them in his battle strategies. Something he did right here.

Drawing power from the thunderstorm and the sky around them. Naruto let the Blue-White lightning from the energy field that was _'the White'_, coated his arms with its luminous brilliance, as he threw the first punch. The Lightning shooting forth like a giant Lance, reminding Naruto of Sasuke's Chidori spear in many ways, only much bigger and thicker, as it struck with a deafening thunder-clap. His left arm repeated the punch motion, accelerating and guiding the exotic nature energy of _'the White'_ towards his target once more. Then he did it again, and again, and again, and again, until hundreds of spears of lightning slammed into Darkseid repeatedly.

Darkseid didn't just take it lying down however, the New God's arms lit up with the Omega Effect as he used his power to swat aside the assault on his person. His eyes lightning up with crimson fury, as he fired a full powered blast at Naruto, that would have killed any New God with ease. Fully intending to finish Naruto there and then.

Once again to his shock and utter disbelief, Naruto did the unpredictable and quite frankly impossible. Stopping his Lightning style version of **Morning Peacock**, the former Jinchuuriki raised his right arm, with the Yang symbol on his palm glowing as it faced the incoming attack. Despite the random pattern in which Omega Beams attacked, they completely failed to curve around Naruto's outstretched palm, and were absorbed directly into the godkiller mark, much to Darkseid's chagrin. Worse yet, the attack did absolutely nothing to Naruto...well, that was not true. It did do something, it just didn't kill him like Darkseid had intended.

Instinctively he felt the additional power coursing through his veins, Naruto knew that this was what his body and his powers were pushing him towards ever since he began absorbing all these different energies and trying to mix them with Six Paths Sage Mode. No doubt they were part of the modifications his _'boss'_ had made to his physique. He could literally feel the slot, that represented the next stage of his Six Paths Sage Mode powers, and he eagerly reached for it.

Naruto's whole form morphed as his skin darkened to a heavy tan, while his golden locks and eyes turned a pure glowing white. His Six Paths Sage Mode chakra cloak inverted, the gold of his chakra cloak turning pitch black and the black sealing symbols all across it, turning a burnished gold. The 6 magatama on his collar each gained a distinct colors, Red, Green, White, Blue, Brown and Purple. The first five representing The Red, The Green, The White, The Clear/Blue and The Melt, while the last color represented magic. All the while an aura white transparent flames surrounded his being.

VvV

"**Why that overachieving glorious blond bastard! I knew he was something special, but damn if his trying his level best to make a liar out of me. He shouldn't be able to push Darkseid this hard, but I can't ignore what I am seeing."** The entity that had brought Naruto to this universe and named itself his boss yelled in disbelief at the sudden change events, an amused grin on its face as it watched the fight. With snap of its fingers, a couch, a bucket of popcorn and a coke appeared in its hands as it settled down to watch the fight more closely, and for the first time ever, it ignored its duties to the multiverse.

VvV

Darkseid shot forward clearly unwilling to let this sudden transformation finish, his punch slamming into Naruto with enough force to shoot him into the core of the planet. Instead Naruto instinctively used the Replacement Technique, leaving his **Truth Seeking Balls** with the non-existent log. Before Darkseid could react, all 9 of the truth seeking balls, transformed into **Tailed Beast Rasenshuriken's** and collectively detonated with explosive forces in the Petaton range.

The force of the explosion threw Darkseid high into the sky and directly at Naruto who was waiting with a Devastating punch just as the god shot by. The blow shot Darkseid straight back down and deep into the bedrock of the ocean, which was followed by another punch as Naruto immediately pursued him, digging him deeper into the ground. Hundreds of more punches rained down on Darkseid, physically forcing him through the Planet's Crust and into the Mantle, before arriving in the liquid outer-core. Darkseid however turned the tables with only one punch that shot Naruto in different direction, right out of the Earth's internal structure.

Nature was on the ninja's side it seemed, because despite being blown through the outer-core of the planets depths, he wasn't crushed by it. In fact he could feel the liquid core parting around him gently and guiding him back to the surface, while attempting to crush Darkseid. This unfortunately did not even slow down the angry god as he tried to kill the ninja.

Naruto reemerged from the depths of the planet somewhere near Australia, bursting through the ocean floor and then the water's surface in a majestic spray, before shooting straight up into the sky. In seconds he was above the Mesosphere, where he quickly spun around to looked down and await his enemy, he had something special for Darkseid. Gathering his chakra and concentrating it together between the palms of his hands, not in the form of a Tailed Beast Ball but something even more powerful. He had seen Hagoromo, Madara, Obito and Kaguya all use them in different ways, each a piece of the puzzle and he had the exact same power, so he knew he could do it. But this was the first time he was actually attempting it, the creation of Truth Seeking Ball.

A new pitch black sphere formed in between his hands, taking a colossal amount of chakra just to form one, after having lost his original nine. However this was not meant to be any ordinary Truth Seeking Ball, no, he was also channeling magic, the Blue, the Green, the Red, the White and the Melt into it. Already the ball shifted from its traditional black color to a pure white.

With an exertion of his will upon the newly formed Truth Seeking Ball, it shifted its form into a blade that had once been wielded by the Sage of the Six Paths himself. Naruto admired the familiar double helix pattern of the Nunoboku no Ken, as it formed in his hands. A sword that was said to have been used to reshape his world in the past, and a desperate last gambit by Naruto to weaken Darkseid enough to finish his mission. Unfortunately he could not do that with the sword as it currently was, for it was merely the length of a normal katana. It needed to be bigger, stronger, more destructive and more like its counterpart in legend.

As Naruto thought of these things, Darkseid appeared in his sensory range, closing the distance between them in the blink of an eye, but the blink of an eye was far too slow for the god to stop Naruto's retaliation, especially with the planet itself doing everything in its power to slow him down. By the time the chief god of Apokolips realized what was happening, it was already far too late for him.

Naruto raised the blade above his head and with a mighty roar of exertion swung it down at Darkseid. The pure white blade began extending its length mid-swing as all the chakra, magic and other forms of exotic energy/matter in the blade came crashing down into the wide-eyed god's chest with life-annihilating force before exploding. Had Naruto not already flown into the planet's exosphere, this gambit might have damaged Mesosphere and left billions at the mercy of meteors and solar radiation. It was only through the guidance of nature that Naruto knew exactly where to be when he struck such a mighty blow, and what a blow it was.

For a few seconds a new star was born, visible to almost everyone in the eastern hemisphere of the planet, as white light blotted out the brilliance of Sol itself. Naruto however was not done yet, despite being blinded and deafened from the explosion of his own attack, he flew towards Darkseid using only his sensory abilities.

This was the teams best chance against the New God, and he was already growing too exhausted to keep up this level of combat. He could already feel his Enhanced Six Paths Sage Mode slipping from his grasp as his hair and eyes turned back to gold, his skin lightened to its normal peach, and his cloak reverted back to its normal form. Grabbing Darkseid by the shoulder, Naruto teleported them to a Flying Thunder-god marker in Metropolis where they crashed into ground in an undignified heap.

Both of them getting to their feet almost as soon as they hit the ground, Naruto maneuvering behind Darkseid and grabbing his massive right arm before he could react, then twisting it behind his back. The ninja deliberately hyper-extended the god's arm to the point that a human would scream in agony, and wouldn't have enough leverage to remove him. Darkseid merely grunted at his efforts, while Naruto froze his arm in place with Shukaku's curse marks, empowered by what was left of his Enhanced Six Paths Yang chakra.

Even with all Naruto had done so far, this was only only enough to lower the Dariseid's strength to the point that even when the New God was serious, it was no longer an overwhelmingly one sided battle. But that was exactly the point, Darkseid was finally disoriented and wounded enough from getting hit and blown up by the Nunoboku no Ken, that it gave the heroes the chance they had been waiting for to turn the war around...just as planned.

The New God was in the process of reaching out with his free left arm to remove Naruto and break the **Restraint Seal** the ninja had placed on him, when Diana's Lasso of Truth ensnared the limb and pulled it to the side. Several clones nearby immediately joined her, combing their strength to keep hold of the Lasso as the god tried to thrash around. Other clones activated a sealing array beneath Darkseid's feet that kept him pinned in place. Then before Darkseid could try to break any of this with brute force, a massive clamp made from emerald energy appeared, clamping around Darkseid's body and keep him in place, courtesy of Green Lantern.

With Darkseid fully restrained, there was a sudden thunder-like crack as the sound barrier shattered several times over. The Flash appeared in a blur of speed, even to Naruto's eyes, with Mera and Aquaman in tow, as he used his speed to carry them towards the immobilized form of Darkseid. Then with a yell of exertion, the speedster physically threw the two Atlanteans directly at Darkseid before he could even think incinerate them with his Omega Beams.

The two Atlanteans, with perfect synchronization, simultaneously stabbed Darkseid in each of his eyes. Aquaman with his seven pointed trident and Mera with Wonder Woman's sword, completely blinding the god and taking his most devastating weapon out of play, just before his eyes began pool with the Omega Effect energies, in preparation to unleash the Omega Beams.

"**Rrrrraaaaaaaaaaaaaaaagggggghhhh!**" Darkseid's roar of agony actually brought a sigh of relief to Naruto, they had succeeded at their mission, completing their objective to blind the New God. Naruto could barely believe how much he had done and put up with in order to get Darkseid to this exact moment.

Turning to his teammates, he teased. "It's about time you slackers came to my rescue! I can't be expected to tame this monster on my own, now can I?" There was no disguising the happiness in his tone at seeing them again. The plan had been simple, but he had severely underestimated how hard it would be to execute it.

**Flashback...**

"How are you even alive?" Green Lantern asked, shocked at the sight of Naruto standing their healthy and completely whole. Turning to his buddy the Flash, the space cop repeated the question. "How the hell is this guy even alive, let alone walking Barry? Darkseid literally cooked his goose."

For a moment the scarlet speedster tried to come up with a scientific explanation before simply shrugging, and saying. "I ah...no clue." They had all seen Naruto laying on the ground, dead or near enough that it didn't really matter, and yet here he was standing before them completely healed.

The ninja in question merely smirked when everyone except Mera and Diana, turned to him with a questioning look. Shrugging he said. "I guess I got really good regeneration." Though it was pretty obvious that no one really bought his excuse, nevertheless they dropped the matter.

Rising off of a piece of debris that he had been sitting, Aquaman pushed his way past the Flash and said. "Forget about that! What I want to know is how Mera is even walking around? The last time I saw her, her right leg shared a resemblance with a barnacle."

Mera scowled at his less than flattering description of her formerly wounded limb, before replying in an icy tone. "It was Naruto's doing, and I would thank you not to compare any part of my body to barnacles or anything else in the sea from now on King Orin."

Aquaman nodded sadly, the frigidity in her tone making it clear that just because she had been willing to die for him, did not mean things were okay between them. Even so, Naruto sensed a gratefulness radiated from the King for the fact that Mera was no longer hurt. Gratefulness that was specifically being directed towards himself, even if it remained unspoken.

Redirecting everyone's attention to the matter at hand, Naruto said. "Okay, how about we focus on Darkseid for a moment. I heard Batman has gone to get Superman back with a couple of my clones, so until they get back, we need to keep that evil bastard busy."

"But how exactly are we supposed to do that? We already tried everything we knew, and it did nothing." Green Lantern asked.

"Its not going to be easy Lantern. Our coordination with each other is poor, battlefield awareness less than stellar and and our communication skills with each other are none-existent. These are all weaknesses Darkseid can and has exploited. During our last assault on him, we got in each others way far too often, and on top of that Darkseid is stronger and more durable than any of us." Naruto replied, before framing his chin with his index finger and thumb. "None of this is something we can really fix, our team is far too new for us to do so in just a few hours. The only thing we can do to mitigate this weakness, is to follow a plan and hope for the best."

"No plan survives contact with the enemy." Victor said, having learned that from playing American Football.

Naruto nodded, and said. "True! Which is why this will be a very flexible plan."

"Do you have something in mind." Diana asked.

Nodding he replied. "We can start by having Flash keep a look out for us. If anyone seems to be in trouble, he can get in and get them out before Darkseid has a chance to drop them. Like that." Naruto snapped his fingers for emphasis, before turning to the speedster and adding. "That is of course if you are up for it?"

Flash stepped forward and said. "I've always been better at saving people than fighting anyway."

"Good, and I can help teach you to fight after this we survive this." Naruto said with a smile before continuing. "With you as a safety net, things will be easier for the rest of us. That said, we first have to weaken him before you engage him in close combat, and for that I will need to bring the fireworks. You will need to be standing clear of me and Darkseid when I start rearranging the geographical landscape."

"Does that mean?" Green Lantern asked with a grin

Mirroring it, Naruto replied. "Yes! I am back up to full power now, I can use my chakra freely again, and that allows me to do a lot more than I have previously shown, including this." Naruto said as he flared his chakra to life and entered Six Paths Sage Mode. "Now bump fists with me, so I can gift you with my greatest weapon." A grin spreading across his face as he extended his hands to his teammates.

For all of three seconds the guys in the team hesitated, before Wonder Woman giggled in amusement and said. "The so called courage of men finally shows its true nature. Both Mera and I went through this process unharmed, and without fear."

"Guys, I think the Greek warrior princess just called us chickens." Flash said in exasperation before stepping forward and raising his own fist to give Naruto a fist-bump. Aquaman immediately followed, raising his own fist to bump Naruto's left fist at the same time as the Flash, his pride having been slightly wounded by Wonder Woman's comment. Meanwhile, behind them Victor Stone and Green Lantern silently watched. None of the guys really expected much to happen, and so where caught off guard when golden-orange chakra exploded from out of the Speedster and King of Atlantis, immediately wrapping around their forms in a transparent chakra cloak.

"What is this?" Aquaman asked in awe of the power coursing through his body, he could feel the range of his power over the sea increase by several orders of magnitude, even without his trident as a focus. The oceans felt like they were all his to command at will.

Naruto smirked and replied. "That is my chakra, the source of my power, and for those of you who weren't here for the explanation earlier, the simple and short version of the story is that its weaponized life-force. Truthfully its far more complicated than just that, its an energy field generated by life that straddles the line between science and mysticism. Not that any of that is important right now, all you need to know is that I can use it to enhance you, and possibly your own powers."

"He's right!" The Flash exclaimed in awe. "The Speedforce grants me enhanced regeneration, heightened perception and reflexes, durability and above all speed, but I've never been this powerful. Its like my whole body has been modified to be able to use more of the Speedforce."

"Well don't get too attached to the chakra cloak, its a temporary upgrade at best , and by tomorrow it will have cleared your system unless it unlocks something already inside of you." Naruto said, remembering how Diana's lightning powers had been unlocked. He also believed that something had been altered within Mera, but so far she had shown no sign of it all.

"Well that explains why I feel like I can currently juggle mountains. As an Atlantean of royal blood, I am stronger than the average Atlantean by a lot, but certainly not this strong. And the Ocean." Aquaman said while flexing his fingers, even as his eyes held a faint glow and he looked towards the ocean.

Mera snapped her head towards the King of Atlantis, at his odd comment, asking. "What about the Ocean?"

"I can sense all the life within the ocean, in every ocean on the planet, all at the same time." The King said sounding genuinely dazed.

When everyone looked at Naruto in shock, he simply nodded and said. "My chakra will heal you, increase your strength and durability, as well as act like a force-field around you. However, it primarily augments what you already have in you. In a ninja, that would be their chakra techniques, but in all of you it seems that it boosts your natural powers instead."

Everyone nodded at the explanation, as Flash said. "This will definitely give us an edge against Darkseid."

Turning to Victor Stone, Naruto asked. "What about you, aren't you going to try it?"

"I'm a Cyborg." Victor responded with shrug. "If your chakra is life energy or whatever, how will it even work with me? I am mostly made of metal anyway."

"Who knows, but you might as well give it a try and see what happens." Naruto said, offering his hand in a fist-bump gesture.

The human side of Victor's face frowned at the reply for a moment before, he eventually relented and simply said. "Fine!" While extending his fist. The moment his fist made contact with Naruto's, he felt a rush of energy unlike any he had ever known, flood his body both the artificial and organic parts, and then a computerized voice spoke up in his mind.

**Unidentified energy detected...**

**Processing...**

**Processing...**

**Processing...**

**Upgrade available...**

**Do you want to make modifications to existing Firmware?**

This was alarming, Victor had already gone through one major change to his body when he became a cyborg, that very night. That another change to his physical form was presented to him mere hours after he had learned to control his cybernetic body, was not something he was particularly keen on accepting. However something told Victor in his metaphorical gut, having already lost his real one, that if he didn't take this chance, then he would regret it later. So he spoke the words he felt came most naturally to him in that moment, and said. "Yes!"

**Acknowledged...**

**Upgrade in progress...**

**Upgrade complete...**

Victor Stone couldn't help but note that when the computerized voice said "Upgrade" complete, the physical changes occurring to his body were only just beginning. First his armor seemed to bulk up in mass, as it painfully began separating itself from the majority of his organic body. For a long terrifying moment Victor was left fearing that the process might actually kill him, his heart rate spiking and his breathing becoming labored in response.

Then came the glow, the unmistakable golden energy Naruto had called chakra, as it swirled into place over his grievous injuries, and to Victor's shock, began to regrow the damaged parts. This was helped along by a metallic slurry of nanites that joined together over his missing limbs and formed a skeletal structure for his missing arms and legs. More nanites then poured over the rest of his skeletal system, covering the rest of his bones in a thin layer of the same strange metal his armor was made from, making them virtually unbreakable.

Through a few of the remaining connections between his brain and his armor, Victor had the schematics for the 'upgrade' downloaded straight into his mind. He would have read about it too, if it wasn't simply more fascinating to watch a simulation of exactly what was happening. His flesh regrew at an accelerated rate thanks to Naruto's chakra, covering his metal bones in a Terminator-like fashion. Blood, vessels nerves and muscles, interwoven with bundles of synthetic muscle-like fibers that stored emergency nanite reserves.

A small anomaly in his spine drew his attention, a small marble sized shell appearing, hardened to impossible density's. Within it, a quantum-neural brain was being formed, with hundreds of fine micro-cilia attaching it to the spinal cord and increasing his mental processing power a thousand fold. New replacement organs were quickly regrown, a mix of flesh and hilariously advanced technology to replace what was missing and make him stronger.

Then when all this was complete, his outer armor turned into a liquid silver slurry which sank through the pores of his skin, and disappeared into his body. Only several quadrillion claytronic atoms (**Like nanites but smaller**) were left on the surface of his skin as a thin layer of protection. Somehow several tons of his bulk were completely absorbed by his body while leaving him with the weight of an average human his size and build. Even his hair and skin on the metal half of his head, along with his left eye were regrown, as the metal and old eye lens were broken down into nanites and absorbed into his skin.

The new eye quickly replacing his missing left eye, which had been sacrificed during the process which converted him into a Cyborg. It was now a mix of cybernetic and organic, taking the best of both worlds, this was evident by the fact that it was still colored red. All in all he looked pretty human, with the only reminder of his Cyborg nature being his red left eye and silver veins containing untold numbers of nanites beneath his skin. A black and silver body glove had been grown by the nanites during the upgrade, over most of his naked form to maintain his dignity.

After a moment of observing the change, Naruto snorted in amusement and said. "Okay, not what I expected, but it works."

"I'm...I'm human." Victor muttered in shock, patting down his body and clutching at his healed face as if afraid it would disappear.

Placing a hand on the young man's shoulder to steady him, Naruto said reassuringly. "You were always human Victor, you just became a bit more. Though, I have to wonder about all that metal you were carrying. It turned all liquid and stuff, and then just disappeared." Inside you was left unsaid.

"Its still-." That was as far as Victor got before with a subconscious thought, he brought all the nanites out again. His armor reforming around him in a liquid slurry of metal, before solidifying. However, it looked different now, his form was smaller and sleeker than before. It truly looked like he was wearing powered armor rather than it being grafted to his being. It also shifted around him like a liquid, based on whatever his requirements where at that moment. (Think Ironman Endo-Sym armor from the comics)

"It seems you can switch between forms at will now." Aquaman pointed out, sounding impressed.

"It seems I can." Victor agreed hesitantly, while Naruto merely clapped him on the back stepped past him towards Green Lantern who had had been suspiciously quiet for a while now.

"What about you Lantern? Don't you want a go? Who knows what my power might knock loose." The ninja said offering a fist-bump but the Coast city superhero shook his head in refusal.

"I will pass?" The Lantern replied with sigh. Naruto could sense longing and disappointment coming from him even as he said this.

Surprised by his reply Flash asked his friend. "Why? I mean look at what he did for us."

"I want to but believe it or not, my ring really doesn't like the color of his chakra, and if he tried to give me some of his power, it would throw a hissy fit and stop working properly. There is no point in trading one power for another and without the ring, I don't really have anything special for him to augment. So I will just stick to what I know." Green Lantern insisted.

Not wanting to force the matter, Naruto changed topics and said. "Okay, with that settled, lets get back to business. Darkseid is toying with us and I want to use that to our advantage. We need to blind him, without his eyes he can't shoot his Omega Beams which seem to be his favorite method of attack so far. Diana and I have already shown we can stop the shockwaves he makes when his arms start glowing. So we all need to focus on taking out his eyes."

"How do you propose we do that? If he sees us coming, he will incinerate us." Green Lantern asked.

"I will distract him for a bit and hit him with everything I can throw at him. The second he appears disoriented I will teleport him here." Naruto said while throwing a Flying Thunder-god kunai on the ground, and continuing. "Where, the rest of you will blindside him, and hopefully actually blind him. I will hold him still long enough for Diana to bind him with her Lasso, and hold him down with the aid of a few clones. At best we will be able to buy you a few seconds, so you need to be ready to strike the instant me and Darkseid appear."

"Just a few seconds?" Mera asked in disbelief.

Naruto merely shrugged, as if to say 'nothing more I can do', then replied. "A few seconds is all we really need, especially if Flash can do what I need him to do."

"And what's that?" The speedster inquired.

"I need you to carry both Aquaman and Mera over to Darkseid, faster than he can react and fast enough for them to stab him in the eyes during the seconds we will buy you. You're going to need to be able to get in there, before he realizes the danger and tries vaporizes all three of you." Naruto explained before turning to Wonder Woman and adding. "Also, for this to work I would appreciate it if you would lend Mera your sword Wonder Woman. We need to take out both eyes at the same time. I would've asked you to be the one to stab Darkseid, yourself, but quite frankly I need your strength to help hold him down."

"I don't mind." The beautiful raven haired princess replied with a smile, before drawing her weapon and handing it pommel first to Mera, while saying. "I presume you are well acquainted with a blade Mera of Xebel."

Mera took the offered weapon before taking a few practice swings to test the weight and balance of the weapon. Smirking in satisfaction she replied to the Amazon princes. "Indeed I am, and must say that this is a magnificent blade, Diana of Themyscira. However not much knowledge is required to simply stab someone in the eye, even if that someone is a god."

"Too true." Wonder Woman agreed with a nod.

Clapping his hands together Naruto said. "Great! Mera and Aquaman, pick out which eyeballs you are going stab. After that work with Flash, so that he can practice carrying both of you, and how you will approach Darkseid when the time comes. With the speed boost I gave him, he should have plenty of time to line up his angle of approach, so that you can do what's needed. Batman said that Darkseid had been going out of his way to dodge Diana's sword and Aquaman's trident, its time to put that theory to the test. Now, I don't know what state I will be in when I finally teleport him here, but I promise I you I will get him here. Just be ready to do your parts, and if we succeed here, we will be one step closer to Victory. So any questions?"

"What about the remaining Parademons?" Green Lantern asked.

"Green Lantern, take out as many as you can but do not leave this area, our primary objective is blinding Darkseid."

Flash looked horrified at suggestion, even as he said. "But they will spread out-."

"I know, and I hate it!" Naruto said harshly, cutting of the Flash before he could begin a rant about heroics. "But this is war and we can't save everybody, so we have to prioritize saving the most people. If we do not stop him now, Darkseid will remain unchecked and I can't stop him without you guys. This might be our best and only chance to end this war."

"Thousands will be abducted to Apokolips." Flash

"You mean tens of thousands. If I hadn't...died." Naruto's voice faltered slightly as he said those words, but he continued. "My clones would still be around to keep the Parademons in check. But I did, and with Darkseid here, I can't make more and risk weakening myself against a hostile god who is stronger than Superman. Think about it logically instead of idealistically Flash, if you were to zip off right and save as many people as you can, do you really think you could put a dent in the number of people being abducted. Most of the Parademons can fly and you can't. Even if we joined you and targeted every Parademon on the planet in an all out assault, Darkseid would still be free to do as he pleases, and I doubt he would just standby and watch. We've all seen for yourself that he can kill us, I was lucky to come back, one of you might not be."

Flash scowled at Naruto, with genuine anger directed at the ninja, as he said. "You're asking me to turn my back on the innocent people I have sworn to use my powers to protect."

Grabbing the speedster by the shoulders Naruto replied. "I am asking you to look at the bigger picture, and save the world by targeting a threat to all life, rather than the threats to several thousand lives. I know it seems cruel and heartless, but this is not an easy choice even for me. I wouldn't wish the burden of such a decision on anyone's shoulders, but we are at war, and war is hell. No one gets to walk away from it innocent."

Flash seemed to vibrate in fury, but he did not dash off. Finally with sigh, he said. "Lets just get this over with."

"For what its worth Flash, I've been in your shoes. When I was 17 I was caught up in a war and one day the enemy used his power to wipe out an entire battalion. One of my commanding officers chose to save me over countless others because my powers just happened to be necessary for ending the war. I watched over 15,000 of my brothers and sister die that day, and all I could do was ask myself why me instead of them. I never did understand the choice that Commander had to make, prioritizing me over so many other life's." He said sadly while turning away from the speedster, before adding. "That is until today, right here, where I am faced with that exact same choice. We can't stop Darkseid without you, and if he isn't stopped this invasion doesn't end."

There was a tension in the atmosphere as everyone processed what Naruto had just said and what he asking them to do. To let a few humans be sacrificed in order to stop or at least cripple the global threat that was Darkseid. It went against every fiber of each of their beings, their heroic natures wrestling with the very idea, but they all understood that stopping a few Parademons instead of crippling Darkseid would be an even greater betrayal of their oaths to protect humanity.

"I think I speak for all us when I say, we will do what needs to be done!" Green Lantern said, after a moment. The others quietly nodding in confirmation.

Naruto sighed in relief as he said. "Good. Be ready, once we blind him, if I have anything left in the tank I will send clones after the Parademons"

**Flashback end...**

The Flash, with his usual swift efficiency plucked both weapons from Darkseid's ruined eyes before the New God could even react in pain, and returned them to their owners, while Naruto backed away from the thrashing deity. It was a gruesome sight to behold, Naruto almost felt pity for the bastard, if not for the fact that he invaded Earth caused so much death already.

"A sword and a trident in both his eyeballs, and he's still standing. What else can we do?" Green Lantern said with a grimace as his construct shattered under the might of the thrashing and now blind New God.

"We can try and send him home." Victor Stone suggested, as he fired a concentrated blast of his white noise canon at Darkseid, while simultaneously raking the sky with his shoulder mounted plasma turrets of any Parademons rushing to aid their master.

His suggestion caught everyone's attention, and Mera asked him. "How can we do that?" She too was raking up a kill count as spears and swords of hard water shot into the sky like rainfall in reverse and utterly slaughtered anything caught in their path.

"Those cubes they've been using to form portals are basically supercomputers. They call them Motherboxes, and I just need to speak their language." Victor responded while ducking under Darkseid and the god swung his fist in the cyborg's general direction, and then backing away. The Xebellian princess's confusion was noted by his processors and ignored in favor of tracking a flight of Parademons coming from the south via a Waynetech satellite uplink.

"Which is what exactly." Lantern asked, as he crashed several fighter jet constructs into Darkseid form, to no real effect.

Victor Stone shrugged and replied. "Ping or whatever?"

The three watched as Naruto jumped and delivered a spinning hook kick to Darkseid's face, knocking him over sideways in a setup for Wonder Woman to try and impale him through the neck. Darkseid somehow sensed what was about to happen and grabbed the sword his bare hands before, punching the Amazon away. The blade still drew blood, which was in everyone opinion progress.

With a grunt of exertion Cyborg focused on the Motherbox which was still integrated with his body, and responsible for keeping most of his armored mass stored away in a micro-dimension. He then focused on all the other motherboxes in the city and around the world. Once connected he forced hundreds of boom tubes to suddenly open, not just in Metropolis but across the planet.

Most of them quickly began sucking any nearby Parademons into them, as if they were trapped in a gravity well, leaving the Earth clear of their presence. One even opened up behind Darkseid, to ferry him back to his homeworld, yet despite being blinded and attacked by numerous heroes, he completely resisted the gravitational pull of the portal.

"Kid, whatever you're doing keep it up." Green Lantern said with an excited grin as he noted what few Parademon were around, getting sucked up by the portals.

"I can't do this for very long. I can see Batman, Superman a thousands of civilians who were taken. They saved them, and they are coming through one of the portals on the outskirts of Metropolis." Victor said with excitement tinging his own voice at the fact that the tide was finally turning. Turning to Naruto who had leaped back from one of Darkseid's attacks, he said. "Sage, Batman needs your clones to help on the other side of the portal. He has civilians coming through a portal on the edge of the city, and while I managed to get rid of all Parademons on Earth, I am sure you understand where I sent them."

"Rodger that." Naruto replied blocking a backhand that sent him flying backwards, all the while crossing his fingers and yelling. "Diana, take over for a minute! **Mass Shadow Clone technique!**" hundreds of clones phased into reality around him. It was a paltry sum compared to what he could normally do, but Naruto was exhausted at this point. Without a word they all blurred towards the portal that had humans coming through it.

VvV

Apokolips, Remnants of Desaad's labs...

The Naruto clone smiled as he held the spoils of his victory against Steppenwolf. The New God's own war axe, along with his severed hand still attached to it. The New God had only escaped death when he fell through a portal, much to the clones annoyance. Steppenwolf was nowhere near Darkseid's level of power and durability so he was far easier to handle, despite Naruto being a mere clone. Their battle was decided by pure skill alone, and in the end Naruto proved himself to be significantly more skilled at close combat than the god.

Unfortunately it seemed that Desaad had also escaped through portal while his other clones where using a few aggressive interrogation technique's that the original Naruto had picked up from Anko back in the day. Darkseid's chief scientist hadn't really given them anything useful, before he escaped, be he would definitely be feeling the effects of the interrogation when he woke up in the morning.

_'Technically this means I have fought against four gods now. Man my life is weird.'_ The clone thought to himself before turning towards where Batman was directing thousands of civilians through a portal that had opened up to Earth nearby. Superman was off, with two of the less chakra exhausted clones to rescue civilians and demolish the facilities responsible for making new Parademons.

Those clones would dispel after using their attacks, and their chakra and memories would pass on to him, after which he would head through the portal. The intelligence they had all gathered, needed to be returned to the original Naruto at once, provided he was even alive. _'But he has to be or I wouldn't be here.'_

Frowning as the Parademons which had been forcefully returned to Apokolips suddenly began to gather in order to charge the escaping humans, the clone prepared to intervene. Thankfully it wasn't necessary as about a hundred fresh clones suddenly shot through a nearby portal and immediately began engaging the Parademons.

One of them spotting him, ran up to him and said. "You're one of the ones that came here with Batman."

"Yeah. We rescued Superman, and he's been helping rescue the civilians." The old Naruto clone replied.

With a nod, the new clone said. "I see. But he is needed by the others on Earth. The original used up most of his remaining reserves to create us, in order to relieve and help with protecting the civilians. We need to get in contact with Superman."

There was sound like thunder as the air rippled and cracked, to which the older clone said. "No need. I think he heard you."

"Right, super-hearing." The younger clone then looked at the war axe and the arm still attached to it before saying. "I take it you had some fun."

"Meh, for a god. The guy who owned this axe wasn't that tough." The older clone said with shrug, before picking up the weapon and limb, then sealing it away in a scroll. "I better get this back to the original on Earth. I am sure you guys will enjoy blowing chunks of this shitty planet up."

"Of course, Darkseid's invasion wrecked lots of cities on Earth. Its only fair." The younger clone replied with a grin.

VvV

Superman shot through the portal like a bullet, to find Darkseid with his boot on a weakened Naruto's chest, after managing to tag the exhausted ninja. The blind god was in the midst of fending of the other heroes who were attacking, when the god-like alien slammed into Darkseid, freeing Naruto.

Though he could not see, Darkseid retaliated with a punch but Superman caught it and stopped it cold, matching and exceeding the New God's weakened strength. Darkseid immediately tried with his other hand and Superman caught that too before pushing, blatantly overpowering Darkseid who tried to dig his feet in and resist the man of steel. Within seconds, Darkseid was forced to his knees, meanwhile Superman's eyes lit up with solar fury and he deliberately began cauterizing the New God's eyes, further damaging them.

Graaaaagghhhh!

Superman ignored his screams of pain and backhanded Darkseid away, sending him flying through the smoking remnants of several buildings Metropolis's New Troy district. Speeding past the god as he was in mid-flight, Superman punched him right back the way he came where he slammed in the midst of the heroes, after making several more holes in the ruined buildings of the Kryptonian's home city.

Darkseid rose to his feet quickly, sensing he was surrounded and moved to punch the nearest person, Green Lantern. However Superman was their in an instant and caught Darkseid's punch, holding the gods hand in place, while Wonder Woman's lasso wrapped around Darkseid's neck, pulling him in the opposite direction. This had the effect of fully extending Darkseid's right arm out, until it was completely straight. At which point Sage suddenly jumped and dropkicked Darkseid in his elbow joint, dislocating the limb with a sickening pop.

"Ggrrraaaaaaaaahhh!"

Darkseid's cry of agony went completely ignored as Diana released him, while drawing her sword and slitting his Achilles tendon equivalent, making him stumble to one knee, only to get punched to the floor by Superman. Climbing above him Superman deliver two mighty punches that nearly sank New Troy into the ocean due to the force behind them, before blasting Darkseid directly in the face with his heat vision again, much to the gods agony.

He then grabbed Darkseid's foot and threw him at open portal hopping to get rid of him. Yet somehow, Darkseid even with only on arm fully functional, blinded and hamstrung, he managed to catch the edge of the portal and prevent himself from fully being sucked in. Thankfully Sage had the perfect going away present in mind.

"Damn persistent bastard!" The ninja cursed while visibly gathering energy in his, that formed a myriad of colors and yelling. "Victor get ready to shut the door in his face!"

With that Naruto simply thrust his hand forward, the ball of energy accelerated morphing into what looked to Kal-El like the double helix of a DNA strand...except with a swords pommel at the end. The double helix shaped sword turned bitch pitch black even as it left Naruto's hand, then to a brilliant white, as it extended forward and slammed into Darkseid's chest, with the force of a moon crashing into a planet.

The blond ninja would later explain to the Kryptonian that what he witnessed was a blade that was said to have been used to reshape the world, by his ancestor Hagoromo Otsutsuki. Only this time it was imbued with the raw natural energies of this Earth. Unleashing a volatile mix in that moment of magic, the Clear, the Melt, the Green, the Blue, the Red, along with much more directly into Darkseid's chest, and in the process dislodging the gods grip from the edge of the portal.. Then a panicking Naruto yelled. "Victor shut the door!"

For a second, the world turned pure white. The resulting explosion of power from the collision would have reduced the entire state and many more of the surrounding states to a wasteland if the Boomtube hadn't automatically sealed shut, as soon Darkseid fell inside, conveniently containing the explosion within another reality and protecting them all. Even then Superman could hear reality itself shudder.

VvV

The job was done, they had won, and Naruto was so exhausted at that point that he didn't even notice himself falling onto his back. For all the barrenness of the rock beneath his body, it might as well have been the presidential suite at the best 5 star hotel in the world, with the softest most relaxing bed. He wouldn't have noticed.

Taking a deep breath as he simply looked at the fading stars in the sky above, the light of dawn already tinging it pink on the horizon. Naruto began to laugh as he thought. _'It was over, it was truly over!'_

It began as a mere giggle, but quickly turned into a deep belly laugh as he held his sides and let out everything in a genuine heartfelt laugh of relief at the ridiculous situation he had just survived. Never in his life had he imagined he would ever fight two different gods and live to talk about it...okay he had died both times, but the point was he was still here.

His laugh was pretty infection because within seconds the others started to join him, all of them except Batman of course, who had just joined from rescuing civilians. Still the Gothamite smiled at the scene, despite no one really saying anything, they all understood what was happening here.

They had won the war, a war that had seemed impossible to win, against a god that had seemed impossible to defeat. The situation seemed so ridiculous, and yet they had done it and without any casualties on their team...casualties that stayed dead anyway. Even the Terran gods of old had not succeeded in defeating Darkseid thousands of years ago, and had only managed to stall him until New Genesis intervened. Admittedly, Darkseid hadn't attacked with the full military might of Apokolips for some reason, but this was still a very impressive achievement on their part.

Suddenly there was applause and rounds of cheers coming from thousands of civilians who had been rescued from Apokolips, they had followed Batman towards the group heroes, and while Metropolis was a wreck. It was clearly over. Above them small fleets of helicopters and fighter jets flew, having rushed towards Metropolis as soon as the Parademons disappeared everywhere.

Tiredly rising to his feet Naruto said. "I'm gonna sleep for a week after this."

"Amen to that brother!" Green Lantern responded from where he was floating, looking just as happy at their victory as everyone else. A new age of heroes had dawned on the world that day, one that was about to change everything.

* * *

TBC...

Okay, so I hope you enjoyed this chapter, next chapter will deal with the aftermath of the whole invasion and serve as mostly a filler chapter connecting to the next arc of the story. Because a lot of my stories and notes went down with my laptop when my computer crashed, I will probably do some new stuff instead of uploading chapter 2 of Born of Fire and Remnant of Dawn. That said, AUH and Sage of Will continue as my primary stories. I've got a pretty decent idea of where I want to take them, so no problems there.

Now I will see you next time, and please leave a review, they give me a feel for everyone's expectations and guidance on how I can improve the quality of my work, and myself as an author. You simply have no clue how much your reviews influenced the outcome of this chapter and the story as whole going forward.

Till next time, Scarlet Out!


	5. Chapter 5: In the Aftermath

Pairing: Naruto/Supergirl/Wonder-Woman/Grail/Mera/Shay Veritas/Zatanna/Poison Ivy/Donna Troy/?

Disclaimer: I do not own the Naruto franchise or DC comics. I simply do this for fun and to improve myself as writer.

**A/N:** Hello everybody, I am back! I apologize for my long absence, it took a while to get myself back into the right headspace to start writing again, and I need time to mourn my friend. So I am really sorry for leaving you hanging for so long, but thank you for being so patient with me. Anyway, I am ready to get back into it. You know how these things go, if you fall out of the saddle, the only thing to do is get right back on that horse. Thanks .16, you were right.

Anyway, this chapter which is already much longer than I would've preferred, was initially significantly longer. It focuses mainly on the immediate aftermath of the invasion, but due to the sheer ridiculous length of it, I decided to cut out entire chunks of it. There was originally a lot more scenes dealing with people's reactions to Naruto, but I decided to focus more on Naruto and how he was dealing with this strange world he had found himself in. You will still get a couple of reactions, and things are being set up in secret that will have a major impact on Naruto and the Justice League in future. Naruto also goes around showing different sides of himself to different people, the more he trusts someone the more of the real him he is willing to show. Keep in mind that the person he currently trusts the most in the world is Madame Xanadu, so she knows a good chunk of his story and secrets. There isn't a whole lot of action in this chapter, and sorry if at one-point mid-way through the chapter Naruto just seems to go on and on talking. I wanted to shorten it but I promised a bunch of guys who PM'd me that I would drop it today, so yeah...

I also wanted to say a special thanks to NyaNyaKittyFace. A funny story is that I actually finished this chapter originally back in November last year and was all set to publish it, then just as I was clicking the save button, power went out right as it was saving. This ended up corrupting the whole file and I had no back up. I just went ballistic after that, I was so pissed and utterly shocked that it took me a few days to even think of starting the chapter again. Even then, I had a spent a month researching everything I wanted for the chapter, and I couldn't really bring myself to do it again. I was feeling so low and disappointed with how everything had turned out, then NyaNyaKittyFace sent me a review. It was just what I needed to here to get me over that moment and keep me going, so thank you,

The same goes to all of you guys who have been sending private messages. Oh how you aggravate the perfectionist in me who wants to make sure everything is just write before I publish my chapter. You can all be so annoying at times, yet it's because you keep pushing me to publish more content, keep asking me questions about the story and keep sharing your opinions that I am able to do even half as well as I currently am. You guys truly make me a better write, and I am grateful for you. Anyway, there is a like a hundred of you, so I can't really write a list of names here. I just want to say thank you.

Now, I should also mention that this chapter is completely different from the original Chapter 5 that got corrupted. I just really couldn't bring myself to do many of the things I did in the original chapter, once more. One of the changes is the scene where in the New52 comics and at the end of the Justice League War movie, the team is being honored at the Capital Building Washington. I didn't write that in this version of Chapter 5, I only mention that they were honored.

Anyway, let's just do a couple reviews and get right into things.

**ElementalMaster16:** Naruto's strength will fluctuate depending on the situation, he is incredibly potent against anything divine and most things supernatural, but he was struggle against powerful aliens or even humans whose abilities lie in the realm of science. That said, his life has been weirder than most people and the sheer level of experience he brings to the table, as well as his better training generally equalizes the situation or outright gives him the advantage. The most powerful person doesn't always win in a fight, and Naruto generally just strong enough to put up a fight against most of the stronger enemies in the DC universe. Maybe not a good fight, especially in direct confrontation, but he's a ninja, he is not supposed to fight fair.

**oj:** It's a bit mixed, or rather the masses love them but the governments of the world are far warier. I was going to show all those reactions but that would have added another K10 words to the fic, and proofreading large chapters' sucks. Don't worry, I will add some of those scenes to the upcoming chapters.

**RubixJr:** I considered Hawkgirl at one point, but the harem is already about as large as I can manage while making it a somewhat realistic story. Remember, I need write Naruto's relationship developing with each of these girls and give legitimate reasons why they would even consider sharing him with other women, and that's taking into account that Mera is currently throwing pissed at Aquaman for sleeping with her sister. So the harem is already pretty tricky to write, adding anymore girls is currently beyond what I feel myself capable of writing. That said, there will be other Naruto/DC crossovers in future, and I will consider them there.

**dloold87:** Yeah, Darkseid is rather interesting when you think about it. He is a multiversal being that exists in the godsphere and is the self-proclaimed god of evil, not that anyone would dispute that. It also seems like when he uses a boomtube to travel between the fourth world and the multiverse, he is projecting a fragment of his power into an Avatar that he controls. At least that's what I got from reading Final Crisis. It also makes sense when you consider that other gods, who are Old gods now, have multiple bodies in each universe but are also said to multiversal beings in the same way as Darkseid. Anyway, glad you enjoyed it.

**RajahDLajah:** Of course I plan to continue. This story will go all the way up to where it currently is in the comics at least. I have no intention of stopping.

**The Storm Master 567:** Thanks! That really means a lot to me. I have a bunch of Naruto/Fate stuff planned.

**NobodyOwens5:** No problem. As for the way the story progression, I won't time skip to five years later when David Graves goes all crazy. Rather, I am bringing Supergirl's arrival early, and creating some Atlantean drama between Mera, Naruto and the people of Xebel. There is also the fact that I am writing sections of Wonder Woman's New52 origin as canon, as well as most of her Rebirth stuff. At least everything regarding Firstborn and Donna Troy will be canon. It will all take place within the 5 year time skip, along with a few original mini-arcs.

Okay that is enough reviews for now, let's get on with the story. I really hope you enjoy it and please remember to leave a review at the end.

* * *

Chapter 5: In the Aftermath!

"_We saved the world that day and we were named global heroes. We ushered in a new age of heroism across the world, but not peace, never peace. Peace, was all I ever wanted for the world, but humans love war and the universe was full of it, it threw everything it could at Earth and more. Unfortunately for me, and it's a little hard to even admit it, but I've always been better at war than I have at peace. I wonder what my parents and Jiraiya would think of me now if they could be here to see me."_

— **Naruto Uzumaki**

**oOo**

**Dreamscape...**

"_What happened here Chunin?" Sasuke Uchiha asked as he looked around at the utter devastation of what had once been a small civilian town, near the borders of Tsuchi no Kuni. The Iwa Chunin was apparently all that was left of its population of 2000 people._

"_Huh? I-it...I, I'm." The older Iwa shinobi fumbled over his words, as he looked around at the devastation, too shell-shocked to properly respond. Sasuke noted that when he finally did look back at him, it was as if he was staring through him, rather than actually seeing the Uchiha scion. Only years of shinobi training and discipline had allowed the Iwa-nin to even attempt a response but he was still far too shocked to deliver anything useful. Realizing this, Sasuke decided to help him along._

_Madara Uchiha had definitely done this, there was no question about it in Sasuke's mind. The Juubi Jinchuuriki's presence had momentarily flared up in this area and both he and Naruto were dispatched by the Gokage to this location. That was less than sixty seconds ago._

_At the moment Naruto was flying around in the air above them, keeping an eye out and using his senses to determine if Madara was in the area, while Sasuke investigated what happened to the town. The entire mountain valley, the lake at its base, the forest surrounding it and the town along the lake shore. All of it was just gone, torn asunder like a gigantic god had reached down from the heavens and start pummeling the earth into a massive chasm. The ground around them was still molten and releasing incredible amounts of heat from whatever attack Madara had used here._

_The Chunin Sasuke was talking to was the only survivor, and there was no doubt in Sasuke's mind that Madara had allowed him to survive deliberately. If the man was too shaken-up to explain what had occurred here, then Sasuke decided, he would just have to look for himself. Activating his Eternal Mangekyou Sharingan/Rinnegan combo, Sasuke peered deep into the man's dark brown eyes, and then through them into his psyche. That's where he saw it all._

_The Chunin, a teacher at the Iwa Ninja Academy had been escorting a group of 30 academy students out of Iwa, under the cover of darkness. They were headed to Konoha where most of the remaining shinobi forces where gathering. Konoha and by extension Hi no Kuni, was now the safest place in the Elemental Nations, due to Konohagakure no Sato, being the home of Sasuke and Naruto. Not even Madara was daring enough to attack it directly. _

_The Chunin and academy students were being accompanied by an eight man Iwa ANBU team for protections, not that it made much of a difference when Madara struck without mercy or hesitation, and wiped out everything. The group had merely stopped at this innocent border town to rest during the day, they were going to continue their journey to Konoha that very evening. Unfortunately, they never got the chance._

_All the Chunin really saw was a brilliant flash of light, heat and then the melting flesh of the ANBU operatives, the children he was protecting, and the towns people around, as it liquefied and fell off their very bones while they screamed in agony, before slowly turning to ash. It was a painful and gruesome way to die, a sight that Sasuke knew would give even him nightmares that night. What the Chunin had witness, had presumably occurred to every single person who was present in the small town. And as for the Chunin, himself had no idea how he was even alive, but this just confirmed to Sasuke that he couldn't have survived unless Madara had ensured it. As a message to them._

_Pulling out of the man's mind, he looked at the poor Chunin with pity. It was bad enough that the man had to watch the Academy students he had been teaching for several years now, a future generation of Iwa shinobi, all perish in such a fashion. Add to that, him being the sole survivor in order to spread the news of what he had seen, and it was remarkable that the sheer terror he had felt, had not completely broken the man. Taking a better look at the Chunin, Sasuke could see that he was shaking slightly, his eyes were bloodshot and twitched in the direction of every sound he heard. He also had tear stains from crying, clearly visible on his cheeks due to dust and ash that had accumulated on his face during this catastrophe._

"_It was all my fault." The Chunin spoke, barely above a whisper._

_Sasuke frowned and asked. "What?"_

"_All this destruction, was my fault. I decided we should stop at this town, and in doing so I brought death to everyone in living in it." The survivor spoke in a haunted voice, his eyes looking dead._

_Scowling at the man's words, Sasuke said heatedly. "This wasn't your fault; it was Madara's. He picked this town on a whim and you and your team just had the misfortune of being here at the time, but he could have chosen any other town. What he did here, was not about you, but rather about slowly breaking the resolve of the entire Shinobi World. To show us that as long as we continued to fight him, he could and would strike at us wherever we were and whenever he pleased, with zero concern for whether the target was shinobi or civilian. It's a psychological warfare tactic, something that Madara as a master manipulator excels at. However, we cannot give in to him, we cannot afford to lose hope no matter what. For the sake of this world, we who call ourselves shinobi have to keep on going forward, and for the sake of our fallen, we must continue to endure or their deaths will be in vain." Sasuke finished solemnly. A deep frown of frustration at the state of the entire 4__th__ Shinobi World War which had been prolonged thanks to Madara and his terror tactics, marred his face. Things hadn't been going too well for the Allied Shinobi Nations ever since Madara had made himself the new Juubi jinchuuriki._

_Taking one more look around at the devastation, and the numerous lives that he and Naruto had failed to save from Madara's madness, Sasuke muttered, more to himself than anybody else. "Naruto will not be happy about this though."_

_Speaking of whom, Sasuke looked up to where he felt a familiar presence hovering in mid-air. Naruto's golden Six Paths Sage Mode chakra clinging to him majestically as he stood motionless in the air, while his face was fixed in a grimace of horror. The blonde Jinchuuriki's supernatural senses, no doubt delivered to him information about exactly what had occurred here._

_Only one thought crossed Sasuke's mind as his bestfriend visibly snarled, and it was. 'Oh no!'_

"_**MADARAAA!" **__Naruto's scream was accompanied by a colossal shockwave of energy, so powerful that Sasuke was forced to shield the surviving Chunin with his Susanoo lest the man be torn to shreds by the sheer power being unleashed. Even so, Sasuke knew that this atrocity would scar Naruto's soul for a long time to come, and that at least for the next 12 hours, he would be no good to the war effort. Naruto would need to grieve for the thousands of lives lost tonight, before he could truly bring the fight to Madara. Sasuke merely sighed at that, he wished he could be as innocent and kind as Naruto. Unfortunately, his time with Orochimaru had changed him far too much for that. The best he could, the only thing he really could do for his friend at the moment, was to pick up the slack for him, until Naruto could get back on his feet again. The day would come when they would make Madara pay for every atrocity he had committed in this farce of a war, and that day would come soon._

VvV

**Madame Xanadu's Emporium...**

The shift from sleep to wakefulness came almost instantly for Naruto. He was suddenly fully alert and assessing his surrounding, despite the fact that a heartbeat ago, he had been dreaming of the past and fully immersed in REM sleep. The dream itself was a memory from the 4th Shinobi World War, a period of his life that still haunted him up till this day, though he hid it well. Except, it wasn't his memory but rather Sasuke's, and Naruto had no idea why he even had it.

Putting that out of his mind, the Jinchuuriki focused on the here and now. He did not open his eyes immediately, instead using his other senses to reach out to everything around him and figure out where he was, or more importantly what state he was. This was important because his last memory was from when he was in the middle of Metropolis with the other heroes of Earth, having just defeated Darkseid. They were being cheered by surviving humans and then suddenly everything went black, with the last thing he remembered being Madame Xanadu's voice. Realizing that he must have fallen unconscious or something and that Madame Xanadu would have been there to take him to safety, Naruto opened his eyes, immediately recognizing the starscape ceiling of his room deep within Madame Xanadu's emporium.

There was a familiar Illusion showing the night sky, magically anchored to the ceiling, while a collection of sounds similar to those found in the forests surrounding Konoha, softly filled the air. The walls were painted a forest green, with black Uzumaki spirals and other iconography popular in his home village. Several potted fern-like plants were placed on the wooden floor, in each of the four corners of the room.

The air which was temperature controlled, had natural scents taken directly from various forests and woodlands on Earth, and was constantly being recycled and controlled via magic as it flowed in on a breeze through the soundproofed open window. Magic preventing any unwanted sounds or smells from floating into his room from outside. All of this served as a reminder of the home that Naruto had sacrificed everything for, and allowed him to forget for a moment as he slept each night, that he was stranded on Earth, a very long way from home.

Naruto didn't have many things in the room, making it seem rather Spartan by all accounts. A small closet held his very few changes of clothes, most of which were black and functional, 14 different pairs in total, including underwear and socks, and 6 different pairs of shoes, mostly sneakers or combat boots. The drawer held his toiletries, a few books and half a dozen sealing scrolls containing shinobi related things that had survived the journey to Earth. He had a small work desk near the window, with a study lamp next to it, and an old laptop Madame Xanadu had given him to connect to the internet and speed up his learning. A reading lamp lay on top of the mini-cupboard next to his bed along with an empty coffee mug and a few books he was currently reading on physics, sociology, computer sciences and mental healthcare. Naruto had decorated the room by hanging a few giant shuriken and a katana on the walls in lieu of actual artwork and paintings.

The only other thing of note in his room was the magical king sized bed, which Madame Xanadu insisted he sleep on, and was supposedly spelled to give him enough energy for the next day, no matter how little or how much he actually slept in it. Incidentally, Naruto was also not alone in said king sized bed at the moment, nor was he clothed for that matter.

"Nimue, what are you doing in my bed?" He asked his first friend in this world, using Madame Xanadu's true name, since they were in the privacy of her home. Naruto had immediately sensed the younger sister of the legendary King Arthur in his bed from the moment he woke up. It took him half a second after that to realize that she was also lying complete naked in his bed, with him, her breasts pressed firmly into his side as she hugged Naruto tightly. This knowledge made him blush quite deeply.

Naruto was fully aware that despite her seemingly sleeping appearance, Nimue was wide awake and alert. Naruto's blush deepened even further as he felt her soft breasts press further into him, when her sleepy hug tightened by a fraction. His face growing even more red, when for a moment her glossy black curtain of locks brought to mind a certain Amazon princess he had recently become acquainted with.

Shoving his less than innocent thoughts about said Amazon to the back of his mind, he patiently waited for Nimue to give him an answer, which she did after a moment, smirking as she said. "Oh don't be such a prude Naruto, you were Jiraiya's star pupil, and we both know that the man was perverted enough to shut down an entire whorehouse on his own. Nothing happened between us while you were unconscious. Not that it would've been very hard to take advantage of you in your sleep."

"And yet we are both naked, and in my bed. How exactly did that happen? I don't even remember getting in bed." Naruto stated.

Leaning into his ear she whispered in a sensual tone that sent shivers up and down his spine. "That'd be because you fell unconscious shortly after the battle with Darkseid, my dear. You've been in a magic induced comatose state for a while now. All that magic energy you absorbed during your fight with the New god was beginning to quite literally weigh you down and put you into a magical deep sleep. For comparison, think of it like the tale of Snow White, with you being the poor princess in this particular analogy. Your very body was unable to process that much raw magic, because while you are quite good at absorbing and handling large amounts of energy, you are not a natural magic user, and so it just ended up trapped inside you, where it lay dormant. In fact, your body was starting to mutate in strange and unknown ways just to keep itself functioning due to the sheer amount of magic you absorbed, when I finally discovered the problem."

"And how long did that take?" Naruto asked with a grin.

"Hours at the most, however the damage was done by then. With the other types of ambient natural energy that you absorbed, there was no problem because those energies naturally sought to return to their own environments in the world once you were done with them. Unfortunately, Magic is something far more unpredictable and fickle. The magical energy you absorbed clung to you rather fiercely, which wouldn't have been a problem in small amounts. However, you had enough dormant magical energy within you to power the entire North American continent for at least a month." She said with an amused smile, clearly impressed with the amount of magical energy he had been able to harness.

Giving his sorceress friend a blank look, Naruto asked. "And what does all that have to do with you and me being naked, in my bed?"

"I had to drain all that magic out of you somehow. Even Snow White was woken with a kiss from her prince, though in your case, a bit more was required to wake you than just a kiss on the lips." She replied with sultry smile, and eyes dancing in amusement. "Short of a tantric ritual, which we both know you would have objected to had you been conscious at all, skin to skin contact was the fastest and most efficient way to drain all that magic from your body. How someone as innocent and prudish as you could be the prized student of a man that openly called himself a super-pervert, is a mystery beyond even my thousand years of experience and understanding."

With an exasperated sigh at his friend who was far too comfortable laying naked in his arms, when they weren't even in any form of romantic or physical relations, Naruto asked. "How long was I out?"

"12 days?" Nimue promptly replied.

"What?!" He half yelled, squeezing her tighter to his chest in his shock, much to Nimue's secret delight.

"That is, 12 days, worth of time within the confines of my mystical emporium. On the outside of the shop, it has been a little over 36 hours since you battled Darkseid." She clarified, raising her index finger with which she tapped him on the nose while drinking in his shock at the news. "Remember, it was more than enough magical energy to power North America for a whole month. Just draining you of enough magical energy to bring you back to consciousness took quite a bit of time, several extremely powerful artifacts and a few favors." With a lecherous grin and a wiggle of her eyebrows she added. "Especially since I wasn't doing it the fun way."

"Yeah, keep dreaming princess." Naruto snorted. Madame Xanadu wasn't at all shy about offering to have a physical relationship with him. Friends with benefits as human's on Earth called it, but he wasn't sure he wanted that with her. Not because he didn't find her extremely attractive, Naruto genuinely viewed her as incredibly hot, but rather because he trusted her more than anyone else on the planet and he liked how things were between them right now. Having sex with her would shift that dynamic into something unfamiliar and he needed the sense of stability that she brought to his life at the moment. Furthermore, he was afraid of losing what they had now, especially since they wouldn't be committing to a real relationship.

"I am a princess of Camelot, and I demand compensation for all the trouble you've caused me over the last 12 days and nights, young man. A celebratory dinner and a fun movie, once you get back from your meeting, will do quite nicely." She declared with all the haughtiness, authority and sense of expectation one expected of your typical Disney princess, though the playfulness in her shining eyes kind of ruined the image, as did her miserable attempt to keep her amusement out of her voice.

Naruto snorted, it was useless to resist. She wanted them to spend time together and one way or another she would engineer things so that they ended up spending time together, even if it meant using a little magic. Worse yet, she was precognitive and not above using those particular powers to ensure they spent some time together. The smile on his face turned into a confused frown a moment later, as he caught on to the last part of what she had just said, and asked. "What meeting?"

Tilting her head to the side, in an act, as if only now recalling something, Nimue said. "Oh, Batman wants to talk with you and a few others. If you shower now, and get something to eat, then you should make it to Gotham just in time. He will be on top of the Wayne Enterprises building, with your other hero friends."

For a moment Naruto hesitated, he knew she wanted him to go to this meeting or she wouldn't have brought it up in the first place, but he also knew and could literally feel her reluctance to let him go. Both through his empathic abilities, and because her hands were still locked around his waist in a rather clingy manner. Naruto knew that at the core of these feelings was her fear that he would get hurt again or worse, die.

"I...huh?" Words were lost to him in light of these feelings coming from his friend. He wanted to apologize to her. Nimue hadn't said anything to him about it but he knew that she must have sensed it when he died, or seen it, it was the only reason he could think of, for the emotions he was currently feeling coming from her. He found himself debating whether to attend this meeting or stick around for the sake of the immortal woman's peace of mind. Surprisingly it was Madam Xanadu who solved Naruto's inner dilemma for him.

"Go! This meeting is far too important for me to monopolize your time, no matter how badly I want to. Today the foundation of a new future will be cemented." She said grandly, before pushing him off the edge of the bed with her feet, while pointed towards the bathroom.

"Right." Naruto muttered as he managed to get his feet under him, even as he fell out of his bed, then grabbing a nearby towel to wrap around his waist, and some other toiletries. Marching to the shower in the bathroom opposite to his bedroom, Naruto paused in the doorway and looked back over his shoulder at Madam Xanadu still lying nude in his bed and not looking like she was about to move from there any time soon, then said. "And Nimue."

"Yes?" She inquired with a raised eyebrow, she turned her head towards him, delicately placing it in the palm of her hand.

With that foxy grin that he had always been famous for, Naruto continued. "Thank you for taking care of me."

"Of course." She replied with a smile of her own, before stretching languidly in a way that clearly showed off her naked body to him. The sheets that had been covering her nudity, choosing that exact moment to suddenly fall to the side. Naruto's face turned scarlet as all of her majestic form was suddenly revealed to him, and he quickly turned his back to her, even as the chuckling Nimue Inwudu aka Madam Xanadu added. "It's quite literally been my pleasure Naruto. One gets bored after going it alone for over a thousand years."

Still looking anywhere but at his naked fried while fighting down his blush, and attempting to get a raging Naruto Jr. back under control, he nodded in acceptance. Naruto better than most knew the pain of loneliness, and was internally happy that he could bring the immortal woman's pain to an end, even if only momentarily.

"You know that I am always going to be there for you, right? Just like you've been here for me, ever since the day I first arrived here." He asked. There was a strange determination shining in his eyes, and his voice was more serious than she had ever heard from him.

"I know." She replied just as seriously, making Naruto grin. Reluctantly she said. "You better get going, or you won't make it for that meeting I mentioned."

"Right!" Naruto replied as he quickly left the room for a shower, a preferably cold shower. The only thought on his mind being. _'Crazy super-attractive immortal witch! Jiraiya must be having a ball wherever he is.'_

VvV

**Rooftop of the Wayne Enterprises building, Gotham...**

"Sage, thank you for coming! I didn't think you would get my message in time." Batman said as he looked up into the sky, watching the hero descend to the rooftop.

Naruto shook his head in the negative as he replied. "Oh I didn't get your message at all! Luckily, Madame Xanadu can see the future and foresaw this meeting taking place with me present for it. She was the one who told me to come here."

"I will take that into account next time I need to you for something." Batman muttered, before gesturing to the other two heroes present.

"Superman! Victor! Good to see you guys." Naruto greeted the Man of Steel and the cyborg kid he had helped during the invasion. Victor had arrived in his human form for this meeting, dressed in a pair of Jordan sneakers, black baggy jeans and a gray Nike hoodie that shadowed his face. His left eye glowed a deep and ominous red from under the hood's shadow.

"Likewise Sage." Superman replied with a nod and a smile.

"Same here. Oh, and I am going by Cyborg now. I mean I was staring at myself in the mirror last night, and I figured that I might as well embrace it, right?" Victor Stone said confidently, thumping his chest. Even as he did so, he began shifting from his human form into his armored combat form, a slurry of liquid silver metal pouring out of him as it swallowed his clothing and covered his flesh in armor.

"Awesome." Naruto replied with a nod of acceptance, before focusing on the fact that it was only the four of them present. Finally, he asked. "So, where are the others? Won't they be a part of this meeting?"

"We will be meeting with them tomorrow." Batman responded. "Tonight the four of us need to deal with something we exclusively experienced."

"Apokolips." Cyborg said to which Batman nodded.

"Indeed. Sage, myself and Superman have all physically been there, while Cyborg, you were in their Motherbox network and downloaded a massive amount of information on them." Batman said, immediately getting into the details of why the meeting was called. "In short, we all gathered different pieces of intel from our encounters and experiences in regards to Apokolips. The reason we are all here tonight is to compile all that intel into a single data packet which we will share with the team tomorrow, and the government after that."

"Why the government?" Superman asked. "Just curious." He added when everyone looked at him, he was not one for trusting the government wholeheartedly.

Batman replied. "President Anderson contacted Victor's father, Dr. Silas Stone, in order to get into contact with Victor and through him, get a message to us. He has an offer for us, one that I think we should seriously consider."

"What's the offer then?" Naruto asked.

"He wants us – as in our group – to continue on as an official superhero team, intervening in state and global level events across the world, in addition to the usual song and dance we perform in our local cities. If we agree, we will have the full funding and support of the United States of America and her allies, in any emergency situation that might arise. Additionally, we will have clearance to cross any borders and airspace we deem fit without contention, provided they belong to these allied nations. We will also have the right to intervene in and take jurisdiction over any emergency situation without our government or the governments of our allies breathing down our necks, or worse trying to arrest us." Batman explained, sounding amused at the idea of their team being arrested by anyone. As an afterthought, he added. "Oh, and Sage will get an official, public identity as an American citizen."

Superman frowned as he asked. "And what's in it for the president? It can't be a coincidence that he is being so generous."

"Obviously! The elections are around the corner. He wants to be seen as the man who rolled out the red carpet for us and openly welcomed the world's first Superheroes. If nothing else, it should do wonders for his reelection." Cyborg pointed out.

"Superheroes?" Naruto asked, having never heard the term before. Being called a hero was one thing and being a vigilante was another, however a Superhero was something new to him.

"It's the fancy new term they are now calling us, instead of vigilantes, because we saved the world. Our prior records as vigilantes have also been expunged from all databases, regardless of whether we agree to these terms or not." Batman said, clarifying things for Naruto.

With a smirk Cyborg added. "I'm sure they're sucking up to us, because someone in the White House had the brains to figure out that its best not to piss off the guys that singlehandedly saved the world, especially since we are all allied." Victor paused in thought before asking in a more unsure voice. "We are all allied with each other right?"

"We are not enemies, and the President wants us to be a team. Whether we will be allies, going forward into the future is something that will be decided on tomorrow, but at the very least we are acquainted, and that's good enough for me." Batman promptly responded.

Superman nodded and simply said. "Agreed."

"We shed blood together in battle. As far as I am concerned, you guys are all my brothers and sisters in arms. At least, so long as you remain the good guys. So I am cool with being your allies, acquaintances, friends or whatever." Naruto finished lamely with shrug.

"Great! Now that that is settled, we will need to bring up the subject with others tomorrow. We saved the world as a team, whether we continue on as a team or not should be a group decision." Superman said.

Nodding vigorously in agreement, Naruto chimed. "Well said Superman."

"In that case, we will bring up everything relevant to the matter tomorrow. For tonight, lets focus on Darkseid and Apokolips." Batman said. Producing a memory chip from somewhere beneath his cape, he handed it over to Cyborg who promptly downloaded whatever was on the chip, before projecting an image of Darkseid from the palm of his hand which had transformed into a holo-emitter. "I doubt we've seen the last of him." The Dark Knight added in an icy tone.

"Alright then, let's get to work." Naruto added with a grin, even as he bit his thumb and smeared a bit of blood on a seemingly ordinary tattoo he had on his wrist. A small puff of smoke later, and he had unsealed the battle axe and severed arm of Steppenwolf, that he had taken as a trophy after their battle on Apokolips. Superman promptly turned green at the sight of it and looked like he wanted to hurl, much to Naruto's amusement who simply said. "Both the axe and the arm belonged to a New god general named Steppenwolf. He and another New god named DeSaad were-" The meeting would go on, late into the night and Naruto would only return to Madame Xanadu's emporium, sometime around dawn.

VvV

**The next day, Jay's super special pizza's, Metropolis...**

"What do you mean she is not coming?" Naruto asked Aquaman, his tone a little too loud for indoors, but then again, as a member of the infamous Uzumaki clan, Naruto had always been known for being loud and passionate.

"Exactly that." Aquaman replied. "Mera wants some space for herself, which in this case means that she wants to be in whatever zip-code that I am physically absent from. As you can see, since I am here, she's made sure that she wouldn't be." Aquaman's voice was slightly strained and he sounded hurt, even as he gestured to their surroundings.

"That's not good. This meeting is pretty important, we need everyone here." Naruto grumbled.

He still didn't really know what Aquaman and Mera were fighting about, only that Aquaman had somehow hurt Mera. He wasn't about to take sides or anything, because it was a private matter, that was none of his business to begin with. However, he liked Mera a lot and despite how briefly they had known each other, he considered her a friend, more so than Aquaman at least. Besides it took real guts to be willing to jump in the way of Darkseid's Omega Beams and risk incineration, doubly so to do it for Aquaman when she clearly had problems with the guy. That and many littler things Naruto had noticed about her, made the very idea that they should meet without the beautiful redhead being present, feel incredibly wrong to him.

"The others are on the way, but Mera ditched her communicator and took a dive into the ocean before I could properly convey the importance of this meeting to her. She doesn't even know where we are meeting, and could be anywhere by now." Batman said. He had called everyone that morning and had given them the location and time for the meeting, as well as confirmed all of their attendance except for Mera. So far only Naruto, Aquaman, Batman himself and Superman had arrived, though Superman had gone outside to fly around for a bit and help around in his city wherever he could, until the meeting began. The four of them were all a little early anyways.

Frowning Naruto turned towards the door and said. "Then I will go get her."

Before he could leave, a firm hand landed on his shoulder and he turned to find Aquaman giving him an intense look. The Atlantean King's eyes held a deep sorrow and regret in them, which Naruto was sure was related to his issue with Mera. He took a moment to lock gazes with Naruto, as if searching for something in his eyes, before finally saying. "Are you sure you can really convince her to attend this little get together? Especially with her knowing that I am here."

"I will convince her." Naruto replied confidently, but added no further explanation much to Aquaman's chagrin. He had convinced some of the most dangerous killers on his homeworld to turn back from their misguided beliefs and walk in the light, so he was sure he could easily convince Mera to lend them a few hours of her time. Looking to Batman, he said. "Give me thirty minutes."

"You have twenty." Batman responded.

"Uh-huh. I will be right back." Naruto said, waving over his shoulder without looking back, as he walked out of the restaurant that the team was gathering in.

Outside of Jay's pizza place, there was a military cordon surrounding the restaurant. Personnel from the different departments of both the military and law enforcement, were stationed there in order to keep an eye on the Superheroes, as well as to, in theory, prevent anything bad from happening to them. The unspoken reason for why they were there however, was to prevent any civilians from pissing off the group of the most powerful beings on the planet, and to hopefully glean any kind of information about them they could manage, without looking like they were spying. Somehow word had gotten out about their get together, and the government had thrown everyone it could get away with on short notice, at them.

Casually waving at a pair of female soldier he spotted who waved back from their sniper nest on a rooftop across the road, Naruto knelt to one knee in the middle of the street and closed his eyes, before very carefully entering Sage mode. Now that he was aware that there were additional risks to using Sage mode here on Earth, he deliberately focused on pushing away any magic and most of the other Elemental forces he could sense. Carefully he formed a limited connection to the Clear and only the Clear.

The Clear or the Blue as it was also called, was the energy field that connected and pervaded all aquatic life and oceanic themed elements. Granting those who could connect to it, powerful hydrokinetic abilities among many other gifts. When combined with his chakra and sensory powers, Naruto was able to use it to scan any water body with life in it that he focused on, regardless of distance. In this case Naruto used it to check if Mera was in or near water, which there was a very high chance of, seeing as she was an Atlantean.

Thankfully his gamble paid off and after a few seconds he detected her somewhere off the coast of Miami Florida, on an isolated and nameless islet. Due to the sheer amount of life in the oceans, lakes and rivers, Naruto had to specifically look for Mera's life-force signature, while pushing aside everything else as useless data, lest his mind be overwhelmed by the information. He had memorized the life-force signatures of everyone on the team except for Green Lantern, Batman and Superman, because he hadn't given any of them his chakra during the battle with Darkseid. Naruto could sense those three well enough when they were nearby, but locating them out of billions wouldn't be possible, until he did give them his chakra and connected to their life-force signatures.

Rising back to his feet, Naruto dusted himself off, before using the Flying Thunder-god technique to teleport to the other side of the country in the blink of an eye. One of his clones had marked the side of a dedicated Hurricane shelter in Miami with his Flying Thunder-god formula while they were battling Darkseid's forces. This formula was conveniently also really close to the sea, and where he could sense Mera.

With a powerful leap, Naruto was airborne where he activated the flight technique he learned from the 3rd Tsuchikage and steadily made his way, at a low hypersonic velocity, towards the redheaded Princess of Xebel. A minute or two of flight, Naruto found her sitting on the little islet, all alone and surrounded by the deep Atlantic Ocean waters. Slowing to a halt once above her, Naruto began to descend in order to speak to her, slowly because he still wasn't too proficient at flying when he didn't have Six Paths Sage Mode active.

Perhaps it was the fact that she was distracted, that she didn't quite notice his presence immediately or because of his own foolishness in not announcing his arrival to her. However, when he had descended enough for Mera to notice his shadow, despite being lost in thought, she reacted with startling precision, sending a massive wave of water directly towards Naruto with a casual wave of her hand.

Caught off guard by her sudden attack, Naruto could only yelp before he got hit and lost control of his flight ability. Literally getting knocked out of the sky by the giant wave and into the ocean...or rather in this particular case, onto the ocean.

Flipping himself around while in midair, Naruto calmly landed – feet first – on the surface of the water where he bobbed up and down gently, soaking wet but completely unharmed. Realizing who it was that she had attacked, Mera cried out. "By Poseidon! Naruto is that you? I am so sorry I didn't realize who you were."

"Don't worry about it?" Naruto replied waving her off as he began to casually walk across the surface of the water, not at all bothered that he was drenched.

This action however shocked Mera, and the princess asked. "How are you doing that?" Gesturing with her hands to his feet.

"Doing what?" He asked, completely missing out on the fact that walking on water was rather abnormal in this world, even with its powered individuals.

"Standing and walking on water like that." She quickly clarified.

Naruto paused mid-step and looked down, as he finally realized how it must've looked to his friend. "That's right, it's not exactly normal for people to walk on water around here huh. Well, this is a chakra technique taught to all ninja's in my homeland, once they graduate from the Academy. It's pretty useful in situations like this, as well as to improve your control over your chakra."

"Really?" She asked, excited by that tidbit of information he had dropped. "So are you controlling the water to make it solid beneath your feet, and if so, can you teach me to do the same?" Mera inquired, looking closely at his feet and analyzing the way he stood on the water like it was solid ground.

"I guess in a way you could say that I am controlling the water beneath my feet. However, this is not a Water Release technique, Water Release being specific water related ninjutsu technique's that completely manipulate liquids primarily composed of water, and most of forms of water. Rather this is just something that any ninja can do with training. That said, I have been trained in the usage of each of the five elements, including actual Water Release technique's. At a later time if you are still interested, I am sure I can at least try and pass on a little of what I know. Not sure whether it will work though." Naruto finished with a shrug.

He had no idea what the source of her power was, but Mera had already shown incredible control over the water she manipulated. At the very least, he could show her a bunch of the Water Release technique's that Mei Terumi had taught him during the war, and hopefully she would be able recreate them. Maybe even some other ninja related skills.

"Thank you, I would greatly appreciate any tutelage you can offer." She said, sounding relieved. Suddenly looking down in shame, Mera added. "During the fight with Darkseid, I realized how useless my abilities where against him, and that I really wasn't making a difference in that battle."

"That's false, utterly ridiculous and very unfair to yourself Mera." Naruto said as he walked up to her, before sitting down next to the gorgeous redhead. "You might not have been able to strike a decisive blow or really wound Darkseid for that matter, but that doesn't mean you were useless. You were able to distract him, which considering he took out Superman in one shot and did technically succeed in killing me – albeit only for a short while – was vitally important in that battle. I recall one moment when your solid water weapons touched his Omega Beams and turned into steam, blanketing the whole area and allowing me to sneak in and change the flow of the battle in our favor at a critical juncture. If you hadn't done that, he would've seen me coming and probably done something painful – possibly lethal to me."

"I guess." She admitted with a small blush. "But that wasn't deliberate." She insisted.

"True, but what if the next time it is deliberate? What if next time, you will actively be able to manipulate the battlefield to your will?" Naruto asked her, to which Mera looked up in surprise and curiosity. "As far as I can tell, you are just inexperienced in fighting beings of that caliber. Not that I can claim to have much experience fighting gods. I've only fought four gods in my entire life, but the point is, I think you and your abilities have a lot of potential." Naruto smiled as he said this. Mera on the other hand simply marveled at how casual he delivered such a statement, as if it was the most ordinary thing in the world to have fought a god and walked away from it, much less four different one. Despite her disbelief, Mera chose not to point that out to him.

Instead she asked. "Really?"

"Yep! Our powers likely work differently, so I can't promise you concrete results, but I'm willing to work with you and show you every water related trick I know and many others that I picked up from back home. It will be hard work though, and the hours will be long, in fact, I will probably make you hate me for what I will put you through. However, if you get through the training, you will be a force to be reckoned with no matter what. That is if you are willing to have me as your ninja instructor?" Naruto offered, hesitantly.

Mera fell silent, contemplating the offer for a few minutes. Eventually she replied. "Then I will have you as my ninja instructor."

"Great! Then we will start your training next week. I'm going to make you the world's first Atlantean ninja…I hope. I doubt there have ever been an Atlantean ninja before, but you never know. Still, even if there were others before you, I will at the very least make you the best." Naruto said with a cheerful grin.

Nodding, she replied a small smile of her own. "Then I look forward to it." It was a distraction she sorely needed at the moment.

"Oh, you say that now." He muttered under his breath, low enough that Mera did not hear him, but his grin still gave her chills that she couldn't quite explain.

Suddenly wanting to change the subject, she asked. "So, what are you doing out here? I doubt you came all the way here to simply lift my spirits."

"If I had known your spirit needed lifting, then I would've come out here sooner. However, in this case you are right, I came out here for the sole purpose of finding you." Naruto explained. "We – as in the team – are having a meeting right now, and we need you."

Sighing she muttered more to herself than him. "Right, Batman mentioned something about a meeting before I hung up on him."

"More like you ditched the expensive communications gear that he gave you and others last time we were together, except for myself because my friend, Madame Xanadu, took me home early that night. Anyway – the team – the nine of us who fought Darkseid together, well you make nine. Batman wants to brief the rest of you on some stuff that he, myself, Superman and Cyborg discovered while on Apokolips. Mera, I am sorry to say, but this war isn't over yet, not by a long shot, and in the days to come the world will need your strength." Naruto said sincerely.

"Will Aquaman be there?" She asked plainly, her body language turning rigid and her emotions growing frosty.

Looking her straight in her suddenly glowing eyes, Naruto ignored the anger and hurt he felt coming from her when she mentioned Aquaman, and said in a very serious tone. "We will need the both of you Mera. I know that something happened between you two, and that you would rather avoid him or even hate him. As your teacher of the ninja arts, we won't ever have to talk about it unless you want to or its impeding your progress. However, you were willing to put aside your feelings and die for the man when Darkseid tried to kill him. That speaks a lot about your inner character Mera, and honestly, your courage in that moment was really inspiring to me."

Blushing, Mera replied. "I don't think that was anything special. Besides, you intercepted Darkseid's Omega beams and were incinerated in my place. You physically died and came back to life. Now that was something special."

"This is about you not me. Besides, I normally wouldn't jump in front of a lethal attack for a stranger. A good friend, a brother in arms or a family, sure, but definitely not a stranger. However, after seeing how selfless you were in that moment, after seeing **you** at your very best, my body was moving on its own before I realized what was happening. I guess I just couldn't let someone as amazing as you, just die." Naruto said, with a soft chuckle.

Mera blushed at the compliment, but said nothing. Averting her gaze from him.

Clearing his throat, Naruto said. "Anyway, I want you to be a part of the team and help us protect this world from Darkseid and its many other troubles. I want to help the world and I want to be on a team of amazing likeminded individuals, which in this case is the same team as all of you guys. I feel deep down inside me that we started something special that day when we fought Darkseid, and that it would never feel complete for the rest of us if you weren't a part of us. I don't expect it to be easy, and you are going to have to interact with Aquaman on some level sooner or later, but I watched you put everything aside to save him, so I already know you have the strength and determination to get through this. Seeing as I already consider you a fledgling ninja, now that you are my student, I will tell you right now that our motto as ninja's, is "Ninja's are those who endure to achieve their goals". What we are willing to endure, differs from ninja to ninja, and is defined by our goals and our personal ninja creed, but that's the true nature of a ninja's life, it's one of sacrifice. So I am asking, will you join us on this team Princess Mera of Xebel? I might add that Diana would be quite devastated if she was forced to remain the only female on our team."

"She could handle it." Mera replied, a small amused grin on her face as Naruto mentioned the other warrior princess.

Grinning back, Naruto replied. "That is true. Diana is a one hell of a warrior, and a really strong person, she wouldn't be happy, but neither would she really be that badly affect by your absence. Still, I would be devastated if I no longer had one of my friends to watch my back."

"Let's attend this meeting first. I will make my decision after." She replied after single second of hesitation, a slight blush on her cheeks.

"I understand. We've got about three minutes to get back to Metropolis. Batman didn't give me a lot of time to get you, so I hope you don't mind us teleporting directly there to save time?" Naruto asked, to which she shrugged. So taking her hand in his, Naruto and Mera disappeared in a yellow flash of light.

VvV

**Jay's ****super**** special pizza, Metropolis...**

"We're back." Naruto announced as he entered the store with Mera to see that everyone else had gathered already. "Is the food ready, because I am starving?"

"Yep. We've been waiting on you two so that we could finally dig in." Flash announced holding up a meat pizza of some kind for inspection. It was shaped like the shield surrounding Superman's S logo. "Batman paid for the whole menu, by the way." Gesturing to one of two long tables in the room, that was simply covered in all kinds of food, buffet style.

"Awesome." Naruto happily chirped while giving everyone a nod of greeting, before taking his place at the second long table, which also had a few pizza's and other kinds of food. He sat next to Batman, who was at the head of the table, with Superman at the other end. Mera sat next to him, with Wonder Woman on her other side, it was a deliberate action on his part, knowing that Mera probably felt safest with him and Diana. With that settled, Naruto's hands blurred through a dozen seals as he erected privacy seals too fast for anyone but Superman, Wonder Woman and the Flash to notice, not that they were paying attention to him. They were too busy serving themselves some rather delicious looking food to even notice the near-invisible barrier that suddenly surrounded Jay's. Satisfied with his work Naruto said. "Then we can eat while we work."

"Work? What exactly are we doing here?" Green Lantern asked with a puzzled look on his face.

"Our glorious leader can explain that tidbit." Naruto said as he picked up a slice of pizza and bit into it, while thumbing at Batman.

Batman frowned at Naruto, not happy with the way he shoved the duty of providing explanations onto him. Picking up a devise that he put on the table, he tapped it and said. "That should keep the government agents outside from listening it." Then glaring at Naruto added. "Yesterday, Sage, Superman, myself and Victor who is now going by the codename Cyborg, had a meeting. We wer-"

Aquaman gave Batman an affronted look as soon as he heard this and interrupted him, demanding. "Why weren't the rest of us invited? Weren't we special enough to warrant an invitation to this special meeting of yours?"

"He's getting to that Aquafresh, aren't you Spooky? Let's at least give the man a chance to finish speaking before we jump to conclusions." Green Lantern cut in, surprisingly coming to Batman's defense as he chastised the Atlantean King. When everyone around nodded in agreement, Aquaman fell silent with an embarrassed scowl on his face, allowing for Batman to continue.

"As I was saying, last night we had a meeting. After the battle with Darkseid, the four of us quickly realized we had something in common that the rest of you lacked. Each of us, in some form or another, had gained valuable first-hand intelligence on Apokolips. Whether that was by physically going there, like Superman, myself and Sage's clones did or by being connected to their Motherbox network like Cyborg was, and downloading a massive data packet from it. The point is that we all had important pieces of information that we needed to compile into a single briefing packet to present to everyone here today. Our meeting yesterday was basically preparation for this one, so no Aquaman, we had no intention of hiding anything from the rest of you, we just needed to make sure we got all the information we could before we presented it to you." Batman assured them.

"And what did you find out?" Aquaman asked in a firm tone, though his body language indicated that he was still a little embarrassed about his earlier outburst. He had a box of buffalo wings with extra-spicy BBQ sauce, and chips, in front of him.

"Darkseid's invasion was weird." Naruto cut in, before chomping down on a slice of extra-cheesy pepperoni pizza, without explaining a single thing more. He pointedly ignored the looks everyone was suddenly giving him as they awaited further explanation from him, that would not come.

"Weird how?" Wonder Woman finally asked in general, realizing Naruto was not going to reply. She had a half empty tub of chocolate-chip and mint ice-cream she had been digging into. She also had an ice-cream mustache above her lip that everyone ignored.

Cyborg's eye glowed brightly and a holographic image of numerous Earth's suddenly appeared above their table. Everyone looked at it in surprise as Cyborg began saying. "According to the information I was able to dig up while I was connected to the Apokoliptan Motherbox Network. It seems Darkseid has deployed the full force of the Apokoliptan military engine, to fight a war on a different version Earth in another universe, a world that they call Earth-2." The appropriate Earth suddenly lit up as it was highlighted. "According to their records, which I might add are quite extensive, there are at least 50 known universes out there, and Darkseid has been numbering them as he either explored or devastated them."

"What's our Earth numbered as?" Flash asked curiously. He had a large burger in his hand, that he had taken a massive bite out of. Three extra-large boxes of pizza were sitting on the floor besides him, already emptied in the time since they started eating. He was eating very slowly for him.

"Earth 0 apparently, and we are smack dab at the center of the multiverse." Cyborg continued, while highlighting their Earth in the very center of all the other worlds. "We barely got a taste of what his reserve forces have to offer, with him being the only New God – which is his species of god apparently – to have been present here on our Earth during his invasion. Had other New gods and some of Apokolips' more devastating weapons been brought to our Earth, then things might have gone very more differently for us." Cyborg finished his explanation.

"We also learned that he was looking for someone." Batman added, after taking a bite out of the salad he was eating.

"Any idea who he was looking for?" Mera asked, before sipping at a bottle of mountain dew she had picked up.

"His daughter." Superman replied. "While they were...while they tortured me on Apokolips. As I was fading in and out of consciousness between the pain and general sense of...evil. I heard two of Darkseid's underlings talking about how he had come to our Earth primarily to find his daughter." The Man of Steel was clearly uncomfortable with even thinking about his time back on Apokolips and the things that he had experienced while there. Everyone silently swore not to bring up the issue, unless Superman himself felt like talking about it.

Dropping a half-eaten slice of pizza, Green Lantern changed the subject as he said in a disgusted tone. "Okay, that's just sick! And holy hell, what woman would ever let that granite-faced piece of scum climb onto her and-" Of course, he never got to finish his sentence before he was smacking in the back of his head by Flash.

"Lantern!" Batman barked in warning. He looked like he really didn't want to eat his salad any more.

"Ouch!" Green Lantern whined, as he gingerly clutched the back of his skull. Flash's hand had been moving at super-speed when he struck.

With a frown, Flash said. "Bro, we so did not need to hear that. Now I got to go bleach my mind, thanks a lot man!"

"To answer his...attempt at question." Naruto began with a scowl, blatantly trying to ignore the image Green Lantern had put into all of their heads. "I also learned of Darkseid's daughter from the same New God's that were torturing Superman. I fought them on Apokolips, and I can personally attest to the fact that there are other New Gods on Apokolips, many more, however they are nowhere near as tough as the big granite bastard himself."

"When did you have time to fight other New gods? You were on Earth with us the whole time." Aquaman questioned, everyone but those already in the know, looking at Naruto in disbelief. After all, they all distinctly remembered him being on Earth during the invasion.

Naruto smirked as he replied. "Correction, my clones fought Darkseid, however, they are technically all me, albeit weaker echoes of the real me. Nevertheless, as extensions of my will, I fought the two new gods through them." It was by no means an accurate explanation of Shadow Clones or how they worked, but then, Naruto had no desire to get into the details behind the Shadow Clone technique.

"I'm almost envious of you Sage. You can be in more than one place at the same time. Something which even I, the fastest man on the planet, find rather difficult." Flash said. There was a strange sense of longing in the speedster's voice. Naruto also noted that Flash had specifically said 'difficult' not 'impossible'.

Nodding in agreement, Green Lantern added with a laugh. "Yeah, talk about your potential to be the ultimate multitasker and workaholic. The real you can quite literally go on vacation and avoid any hard work, while your clones can remain doing that actual work for you, all at the same time. That is so unfair."

"The problem with that idea is that my clones are still very much me, if I wanted to ditch work then they will want to ditch work." Naruto replied with an amused grin. "Additionally, I get their memories, their pain to a certain extent and their exhaustion every time they dispel. It can lead to some really nasty migraine headaches, though I'm willing to admit that they can be pretty cool, and incredibly useful at times. That said, clone techniques in and of themselves are really not that big of a deal back home, because every good ninja and their grandmother knows at least one type of clone technique. Though I suppose my shadow clones are considered somewhat more advanced than other versions of the technique out there. Still, it's nothing too special."

"Yeah, about that. You said you would reveal more of your secrets when you trust us, and I would like to believe that fighting side by side against an angry evil god has won us some of your trust, right? So if you don't mind, why don't you tell us a little more about yourself." Green Lantern asked, reminding him of his promise the other day.

"I did say that, and I am going to tell you." Naruto assured

Aquaman stated. "But not today!"

"No, I fully intend to reveal many details about my past to you all in this very meeting. I believe you all deserve that much." Naruto reassured everyone present, before adding in a playful tone. "However, I really think we should finish with the important stuff before I start spilling all my secrets to you."

"I supposed we should." Mera agreed, while the others simply nodded.

"To bring us back on track." Batman began, regaining everyone's attention. "Sage provided us with two items for analysis, that he brought back with himself from Apokolips. One was an axe forged with unknown alien meta-materials and hyper-advanced technologies. Its currently being analyzed at a special Waynetech black-site facility that I and I alone have access to."

"And I'll want that axe back by the way, undamaged. It will look super awesome on my wall." Naruto said with a dark grin. Meanwhile everyone fought the urge to facepalm upon hearing the reason behind why he wanted the weapon back. Well, everyone except Diana who seemed to get it.

"Ah, a worthy trophy then?" Diana asked, to which Naruto nodded proudly before mouthing 'Absolutely' back at her.

Batman ignored the two and said. "The other thing Sage brought back, was the severed arm of the New god general he fought. It's been handed over to a Starlabs facility for further analysis."

"And they will only be doing analysis on it, no cloning or genetic splicing. Or else..." Naruto said darkly.

"Or else what?" Flash asked.

Batman, Superman and Cyborg gave each other nervous looks before turning to Naruto who smiled so innocently it was nearly sickening. Eventually Superman said. "Before we left Star Labs Midway City, where we dropped of the arm. Sage threatened that if he found out that they had made a biological clone or genetically spliced DNA from the arm of the New god with, well...anything. Then he would nuke every single Starlabs facility on the planet, and destroy every hint of their research in all of existence, before wiping their minds of any memories related to their research."

Flash looked horrified at the response, and suddenly everyone understood why the other three had been giving Naruto such nervous looks. They had all scene Naruto throw a ball of energy that was essentially a nuke at Darkseid during the battle against him, and that wasn't even his most powerful attack in that fight. There was currently a gaping hole in the ozone layer somewhere near Australia, that spoke volumes of the firepower he could bring to bear if he wanted. Feeling a shiver run up and down his spine, Flash yelled. "What! But that would kill all the works and countless innocents. Not to mention mind-wiping people is rather extreme."

Naruto snorted and replied. "Who ever said anything about killing anyone. I would evacuate the facilities myself before, reducing everything to ash. All of those years of hard work turned to ash in the blink of an eye, it's a suitable punishment for screwing around with life and things that humans have no business messing with. There is no harsher punishment for a researcher than taking all that they had been working towards and destroying it utterly. Mind-wiping them is merely to ensure that they can't recreate that research."

"Still, that is a pretty harsh response, especially from someone who uses clones all day long." Green Lantern said.

"Clones made of my own life energy, that are essentially still a piece of me and rejoin me when they dispel. Genetic splicing and cloning are something else entirely. Look guys, I know it seems incredibly harsh, but I fought in a war against an enemy that had the power to strip people of everything that made them diverse and interesting and beautiful for the sole purpose of turning them into living weapons for her army. The goddess I fought left everyone, everywhere, as nothing but humanoid pale husks that looked exactly alike. In essence, humans were being transformed into an army of identical living weapons for a future war, kind of like what was being done to humans on this planet with the Parademons. Before that, I fought against this ninja mad scientist from my village, who was fond of injecting newborn babies with the blood cells of the first leader of my ninja village, in order to see if they would bond and recreate that leader's special powers. Anyway that's a long story, and not a pretty one."

"I take it that, things did not go well for the babies." Green Lantern asked with a grimace, already reading between the lines.

"Not at all. Only one infant survived out of sixty newborns, the rest were horrifically transformed into monstrous mutated lifeforms. Had the children been able to even somehow survived that monstrous experiment, they would've been put out of their misery as a mercy killing. Yes, I know, the very idea of killing babies is beyond repulsive to all of us, but I need you to understand that those kinds of experiments were simply so vile, that killing babies to give them peace would've been considered an act of kindness. I have seen the result of genetically splicing yourself with something else, particularly something far more powerful than you, go so very wrong more times than I care to count. So trust me, when I say this is all a bit personal for me. If the scientists at Starlabs want to simply analyze the arm, I won't say no, but I have given them my warning. If they start trying play god, well I've already defeated four gods already, one of whom I killed, they will end up wishing they had heeded my warning." Naruto said with a haunted look in his eyes, and bit of a bitterness in his voice that was quite frankly alarming.

"You're so much more experienced than us." Mera finally said after a few moments of silence, breaking the somber atmosphere as everyone took in what he had just said. It was already apparent to the group, while they were fighting Darkseid and his Parademons, that Naruto had an unusual amount experience. However, his words made it even more clear that Naruto was all too familiar with a plethora of varying and rather horrific situations, as well as how to deal with them.

"Only in some things, some very very strange and really out of the way kind of things." He insisted, before saying. "I come from a society where walking on water, breathing out fire and sealing matter into pocket dimensions is about as natural to us, as watching a plane fly through the air or watching a person make a phone call would be to you. Some of our animals talk and have powers of their own, I've met more zombies and ghosts than I care to list, and my grandmother was an alien goddess with a Messiah complex. My version of normal is bound to be different from what people would consider normal on this world, and since I entered the ninja academy when I was six years old, I have picked up and seen a lot of bizarre things. So you know..." Naruto finished with a shrug.

"That sounds so crazy." Flash said. Everyone agreed, but no one really knew what else to say to that.

Nodding his head with a small amused smile, Naruto responded. "I know, but this Earth is just as crazy in own unique way. I mean the internet, airplanes and cellphones aren't even things where I come from."

"I rule a Kingdom under the sea." Aquaman eventually said with a shrug, before adding. "Who am I to judge what's crazy."

"And I wasn't even born on this planet." Superman added. "So yeah…"

As everyone nodded in agreement to Aquaman and Superman's statements, Batman said. "Now, as exciting as hearing about Sage has been, and I in particular want to hear more on this. I would like us to focus on the topic at hand, and not get derailed any further. The sooner we wrap this up, the sooner we will be able to get back out there and help the victims of the invasion."

When everyone nodded in agreement he continued. "As we said, Darkseid has deployed the majority of his forces on Earth 2. He was also only here searching for his daughter. His Parademon hives were serving as both a distraction for us while he fulfilled this task, and as a means harvesting humans in order to convert them into more Parademons and replenish his forces. Superman and Sage have thankfully destroyed these conversion centers on Apokolips, stopping him from perverting the remains of our people, as well as, for now at least, denying the enemy anymore resources. Cyborg also fried the majority of Apokolips's motherboxes and left a couple thousand super aggressive Trojan viral codes in the Motherbox network to keep them busy."

A round of 'good job', 'well done' and 'nice work' was called out to Cyborg upon hearing this making the young man grin. Naruto could literally feel Victor's embarrassment at all the praise, much to his amusement.

"So what where you doing the whole time?" Green Lantern asked, turning his attention on Batman.

"I was gathering intel on Apokolips and freeing Superman obviously. Sage's clones were busy fighting and Superman was still out of it. I recorded everything in sight, then helped free captive humans and direct everybody to the boomtubes Cyborg opened, allowing us to return. The footage I collected is being analyzed, and along with several hundred sketches of the landscape that Superman drew from memory of when he was flying through the sky of Apokolips, as well as data provided by Cyborg, we are in the process of rendering a partial map of Apokolips." Batman said.

"Know your enemy's stronghold, in case we ever need to Storm it." Wonder Woman spoke, as if quoting an old lesson from her days training to be a warrior.

Naruto nodded and added. "Or in the unlikely event we all get trapped there for some other reason. It would be nice to have access to a map of the land."

"Which brings us to the next and final topic of importance." Batman said, while looking at everyone to make sure he had their undivided attention. "President Julian Anderson has made the nine of us an offer that I feel we should seriously consider and decide on today. He wants us to officially become a team that will intervene in national and global catastrophe's, like Darkseid's invasion. In exchange for the formation of this team he is prepared to pledge the full backing and support of the United States of America and its allies. This will allow us to travel through any allied nation's airspace without contention and take command of whatever situation may arise, along with any local emergency or military forces already in place. This includes giving orders to military forces, law enforcement and other emergency services in the event of a crisis, whom will do their utmost to provide us with any and every form of aide we might require while doing our job. This however, will only apply to allied nations, so don't think you can just cross in Bialya do whatever you please. That said, I do not believe I need explain to you how much this would help us in our ongoing efforts to protect the world and our home cities."

"I admit; it would make things easier if the army and Lex Luthor aren't always coming after me!" Superman said.

Green Lantern frown as he added. "The same goes for me and the Airforce."

"The police have been giving me quite a bit of trouble." The Flash said. "So yeah, I can see the benefits."

Mera frowned, as they continued. She hadn't contributed that much during the meeting, mostly because she understood far less about the surface world than others, with her coming from an underwater Kingdom. "The surface world can be so very confusing at times." She grumbled.

"I agree sister." Diana said cheerfully to Mera from where she was seated beside her. "Man's world is a mess. That many would turn away help freely given and without any expectation of repayment, out of misguided pride and suspicion. It's just sad, but I believe things won't always be this way."

"Additionally, any and all records of our vigilante activities will be expunged from all databases, and all law enforcement agencies and in some of your cases, military forces, will cease pursuing you with immediate effect provided you don't do anything criminal. This last bit will happen regardless of what we decide. America will not drag its national heroes through the mud, or so the official reasoning goes." Batman finished, making it clear to everyone that there was an unofficial reason for this.

"Unofficially, it's an election year and the president wants to get into our good graces." Cyborg supplied. "It makes him look good." He added with a wink of his natural eye.

"These documents have all the relevant information you need to know about this offer, and if there is anything we agree that we don't like then we can negotiate it with the government at a later date. Take your time, consider the pros and cons, and make a decision." Batman said sternly, even as he rose to his feet and began distributing advanced Waynetech tablets to everyone.

Naruto barely skimmed over the document on his tablet, before simply pocketing it and saying. "I'm in."

"Batman just said for us to take our time." Wonder Woman lightly chided, to which he smiled back at her.

"I know, and I've decided that I want to be a part of team that can make a real difference. Fighting off threats to humanity, helping those in need, making the world a better place. It's what you guys already do in your cities, and now we will have a chance to do on a far greater level. I can't really say that I have anything better to do, and after this last invasion I've come to realize that the world really needs our help, so I want to be a part of that, and I want to do it with you guys. I have this feeling inside me that you guys would make the best possible team for me to work with. Probably because aside from Madam Xanadu, you are all pretty much the only other friends I have on this planet. But that's beside the point, all I'm trying to say is that I'm in." Naruto explained, before pausing in thought and adding. "I will however mention that there are a few points in this document I noticed, that I believe we will need to discuss at a later date, in order to change them before we officially become a team."

"Well, Sage certainly knows what he wants, and quite frankly so do I. I'm in too." Superman said. "If the invasion taught me one thing, it's that even the strongest man on the planet needs help, and frankly the threats I have been facing on my own have been escalating. It would be nice to be able to call in some back up when things get tough."

Batman had a little smirk on his face as he said. "I don't really need help with Gotham, but the world is an entirely different matter. The world needs this team, and I will be happy to be a part of it."

"Batman and Happy. Too words I never thought I would ever hear coming out of spooky's mouth." Green Lantern whispered to Flash with snort, the speedster nodding in amusement.

Cyborg had a frown on his face as he said. "My life changed when I first became Cyborg at the start of the invasion, and then changed again after Sage gave me an 'upgrade'. I know that I am both the youngest and least experienced person here, and that I wouldn't feel as conflicted as I do now, if I was unable to disguise myself as a regular human. However, because I can disguise myself, I am constantly faced with the temptation of finishing High School, gaining a College football scholarship and making a career in football. I know it's an unrealistic dream now that I am augmented beyond any human and that no matter how human I may look, I am not like the rest. My life has changed irrevocably, and things can never go back to the way they were in the past, and my future that once looked certain is now unclear. I'm not entirely sure of anything anymore, however, one thing is clear to me, and that is that I would rather face that future among friends, than on my own. So I guess I'm in."

"I am still trying to figure out everything about my powers, but I am happy to lend a hand." Flash said with a shrug, as if it was no big deal.

"Normally, I am not a team player, and I already have a job as a space cop, patrolling an entire sector of the galaxy. This means that at times I am going to have to leave the team for extended periods of time in order to fulfill my duties as a Green Lantern. That said, being a part of this team seems like fun, and if Darkseid is gonna someday come back for round two, then I wanna be here to help kick his ass granite ass all over again. So I am down with this." Green Lantern said.

"It would be an honor to walk and fight amongst a pantheon, once again. Each of you have shown me things I never could have even imagined before leaving Themyscira. Now I can't help but look forward to more." Wonder Woman said, with a beautiful smile.

"In case any of you missed it, that means that she is in, and after hearing what you all have to say, so am I for that matter. Like Sage said, I don't really have anything better to do." Mera said a small but earnest smile on her cheek.

"What about you Aquafresh?" Green Lantern teased with a grin, much to Aquaman's annoyance.

With a sigh, Aquaman rose to his feet and walked around the table towards Mera, where he said. "As you've all no doubt noticed, Mera and I, have had some issues. She's also made it clear that she doesn't want anything to do with me, and rightfully so. However, she also clearly wants to be a part of this team, to be with her friends. So for her sake, I am willing to remove myself from this newly formed team, I have a Kingdom to run anyway."

"No!" Naruto cut in. His voice, harsh and firm, while he glared at Aquaman challengingly. "You don't get to run away."

"I'm sorry." Aquaman said, startled by the intensity of Naruto's voice and glare.

"He said no, King Orin, and frankly I agree with him." Mera began, before looking at Naruto who gave her a firm nod and small smile. "Whatever issues we may have, are meaningless in the face of the bigger picture. This isn't about you or me, it's about the whole world. You didn't come to Metropolis back during the invasion because of me, you came because of a duty to Atlantis, and a desire to help the surface world that you care so much about. Our issue's didn't stop you from working with me and saving the world then, so neither of us have any excuse to let them get in the way of us helping the world now. I am not ready to put what happened between us in the past, but I will work with you, trust you even and watch your back." She said calmly. Her eyes were still very cold and angry towards him, but Mera also had a hand stretched out to in a handshake. "Unless of course you have some other reason to not want to join this team."

"Of course not! Thank you Princess Mera." He said, shaking her hand. Naruto sensed a plethora of intense emotions going through the Atlantean King, before they settled on acceptance and determination.

"I am not the one you must thank King Orin. Sage and everyone in this room are the ones who convinced me that it is worth it to work with you again." She said coolly before returning to her seat before

"Now, if there is nothing else pressing. I believe we would all like to hear that story you promised us Sage." Batman said, sounding oddly eager to get into it.

Inclining his head to Batman, the man had truly been patient with him, and Naruto knew for a fact that being so patient when a mystery was dangled right in front of his face, was against his very nature. So as reward, Naruto had decided to tell him his tale, it would be selective truths of course, but far more truth than most people would ever hear. With that he began by saying. "As I said before, my real name is Naruto Uzumaki, and before anything else, I should start by telling you all that I am not from this world."

"Not from this world? Like an alien?" Green Lantern asked in curiosity.

Shaking his head, he responded. "No. I am human, but I come from another variation of Earth, in another universe somewhere out there. Or rather that's what my friend Madame Xanadu told when we first met. The information Cyborg downloaded on the multiverse from the Apokolips Motherbox network, just confirmed for me that there are in fact other Earths in other universes."

"Oh wow!" Flash said in shock, before saying. "You traveled even further than Superman to get here. What are you doing here on this Earth?"

"I was fighting an alien goddess on my Earth, who was technically my grandmother I guess. Anyway, she was hell-bent on taking over the world, and transforming humans into monstrous biological entities that she could command like foot soldiers. I defeated her, but she was a rather petty woman and a sore loser. Using the last of her power, she physically ejected me from my native universe. If she couldn't have my world, then she wanted to make sure that I would never see it again. Anyway, after an unknown period of time, floating around beyond the universe or whatever, I fell through a portal and ended up in Gotham city where Madame Xanadu was awaiting me. She had foreseen my arrival on Earth for a while now, was there to provide me with shelter, clothing and basic everyday knowledge of this world. That was a few weeks ago."

"Well, that explains why nobody knows who you are, you've only been here on this Earth a short while and were probably keeping a low profile." The Flash said.

"Yeah. It took a bit of time to acclimatize myself to this Earth's diverse cultures and technological advancements. I had to do a lot of studying and make subtle observations of the world around me through my clones." Naruto added, with a groan of annoyance.

Batman nodded before saying. "I take it you've been searching for a way home since then. In that case I will do what I can to help you, and I am sure the rest of us would be happy to render assistance." Around him the other members of the team nodded in confirmation.

"Thank you all very much for the offer, but I am not entirely sure it will do any good." Naruto said.

"What do you mean by that?" Batman asked.

He sighed as he replied. "It's rather complicated to explain, but when I was ejected from my universe, I wasn't this physically strong in my base state."

"Base state? What's that mean?" Aquaman asked.

"You've all seen me when I'm glowing with a shroud of golden flame-like energy surrounding me. Well, think of that energy as me being in a higher state, a sort of battle mode that I can enter to drastically increase my speed, strength, durability, senses and abilities. I have several other "battle modes" so to speak, that I can enter at will, but this form I am in right now, this is my most basic form, my base state. Now, before I was forced from my universe, my base state was not this physically powerful. Don't get me wrong, I was still incredibly powerful, just nowhere near this level." Naruto said.

"And what's the significance of that?" Batman asked.

"I can only assume it's the passage of time." Naruto said with a shrug. "I do not know how long I was floating around out there, I also have no way of really proving it, but I believe I am older than I was when I was still in my native universe. Additionally, my fellow ninja will have written me off as dead after a certain period of time. Just showing up back there at the wrong time, has the potential to throw my whole world out of balance, it would also open up a lot of old wounds. Suddenly, those who had decided to put aside their difference for the sake of honoring a hero who gave his life to save them, would find themselves at unburying their hatchets when that very same hero shows up alive. There would be many who would question whether high command had told the truth about me dying, which would naturally lead to whether they can trust their leaders.

"To a ninja, loyalty to your village and its leader is absolute, our leader has authority comparable to a dictator or an absolute monarch. If ordered to die for the sake of the village, many a shinobi have willing to gone to their graves, only trusting that the sacrifice demanded of them would benefit the village and country as a whole. However, it is also the Jounin council, the most powerful and trusted shinobi in the village that vote on whether to accept any leader nominated. If you have the faith of the villagers and its shinobi forces, then their loyalty is absolute, if you lack their faith however, problems begin to arise that could even lead to something as bad as civil war. Regardless of this, I wouldn't want to burden you with the cost and troubles of finding me a way home, which would no doubt be significant." He finished as if it was no big deal much to everyone's shock.

"But that's still your home. Surely you want to go back?" Aquaman asked.

Naruto scowled, and unable to keep his emotions out of his voice, replied. "I do, I miss everyone there and I think of them all the time. But I also know my people. As far as they are concerned, I died to save the world and ensure a lasting peace, and they will honor my sacrifice now that I am gone. However, like I said, just returning has the potential screw that up, and I really don't want to screw up the peace so many worked so hard for. It's the first time in a thousand years that the whole shinobi world is finally working together, the next generation has a real chance to know what it's like to live in a world without war or conflict. I know it won't last, war is a constant in every era, but for a time there will be peace, and I won't risk that just to see the faces of my friends again."

"What about family, don't you have parents or siblings you left behind?" Mera asked worriedly.

Naruto sighed, as he said. "My parents died about an hour after I was born. They were skewered on the claws of a certain nine-tailed fox-shaped fragment of a primordial deity, just as it was trying to kill me. They died protecting me from it, so that I would live, and because they were so young at the time, I didn't get to have any siblings, only friends who I loved like brothers and sisters. Make no mistake, the choice to not go back does not please me at all, but I am a proud Konoha shinobi, if nothing else ninja's from my world are they who persevere for the sake of our goals, even when those goals call for great sacrifice. Over sixty-five thousand other shinobi, my brothers and sisters in-arms, laid down their lives for the sake of this peace I cherish, I will do absolutely nothing to risk jeopardizing it. It might not make sense to you, but this is just our way as shinobi."

"Okay man! We won't force you." Green Lantern said raising his hands as if in surrender. "That was really grim though."

Bowing his head slightly, Naruto said. "I apologize. My life has had its ups and downs; I didn't mean for it to upset you."

"It didn't upset me, and frankly I think we all want to hear more about your life, that is if you are willing to tell us. Am I right guys?" Green Lantern replied, to which everyone nodded.

"Are you sure?" Naruto asked, an obvious warning in his tone.

Everyone nodded again, before Wonder Woman said. "We would be honored to hear your tale."

"Thank you!" He said in an almost whisper, before continuing. "I warn you though, it's not all sunshine and rainbows. I will try and give you the abbreviated version of my life story."

"Just spit out man. We are all friends here." Green Lantern said impatiently, never noticing the slight smile that appeared on Naruto's face when he called him a friend. It was gone an instant later, only a handful of people in the group even noticing.

Taking a deep breath, he began strongly. "Of course. I am the son of Kushina Uzumaki of the Uzumaki shinobi clan and Minato Namikaze, the 4th Hokage of the Hidden Leaf Village. My dad led the Hidden Leaf village and its ninja's, as our highest elected official and political leader. A position known as Hokage, or Fire-shadow when translated into your language. The Fire-shadow was one of the two highest political position in my entire country, which is the Land of Fire, only the Feudal Lord or King if you wish, was higher. Though technically they had about the same amount of authority over the nation as each other, making them both known as the 2 kings of the nations. As I said earlier, they died on the day I was born. I grew up an orphan, attended the ninja academy at six where I trained until age twelve and after failing the exam three times, I finally graduated into a fully-fledged genin, the lowest rank a ninja can attain. A beginner if you will. After that I began taking missions, serving my country in a military capacity until a war broke out just before my seventeenth birthday. The 4th Shinobi World War."

"4th Shinobi World War? You had four world wars?" Green Lantern asked incredulously.

"That's crazy?" Flash asked.

"In your World Wars, millions died. Such a massive loss of life would be beyond comprehension to most shinobi. In many ways, your World Wars were far worse than ours due to the sheer manpower and scale of the wars. In other ways, ours were worse. Only tens of thousands shinobi ever participated in our world wars, but that still tens of thousands of superhuman beings with all kinds powers to reshape reality on a whim. In the 4th Shinobi World War, there were over 80,000 shinobi of the Chunin or mid level ninja and Jounin or high level ninja. Half of that number perished on day one of the war, a war which lasted six months."

"That's awful." Flash said, looking horrified.

Naruto nodded, as he agreed. "That it is. There is absolutely nothing pleasant or beautiful about war. I love a good fight and I am at this point admittedly pretty good at waging war, but I view war itself as with contempt and hatred. All I want for humanity, whether that of my homeworld or this world, is for them to have peace. Anyway, I think I would like to speak about something a bit less heartrending that old war stories."

"Agreed! You mentioned that your country was named the Land of Fire. Why is that?" Mera asked.

"All of our nations had names like that, it was a description I suppose, of my country, its people and our values. The most powerful five nations in the world, were the Land of Fire, Water, Wind, Earth and Lightning, which were home to the Hidden Leaf, Mist, Sand, Rock and Cloud ninja villages respectively. Nearly every country in the world had a hidden ninja village, but only the leaders of the Five great nations had the right to call their leaders by the tittle Kage or Shadow, which was affixed to the element in the name of the country. Fire-Shadow for the Land of Fire, Water-Shadow for the Land of Water, Wind-Shadow for the Land of Wind, and so on. The reason Kage's had so much respect and authority to be seen as the equal of the King, was because they commanded the absolute loyalty of thousands of ninja's, with those ninjas serving as a moreorless a super-powered army meant to deal with supernatural matters in the nation. The supernatural aspect of my homeworld was fairly active, and it required beings far more powerful than average man or woman to deal with it, which is where we ninja's came in. Officially the Feudal Lords were the recognized ruler of the nation and led their respective nations from the light, they also ruled the civilians and primarily dealt with the natural world. The ninja world on the other hand was under the authority of the Kage and their counterparts in the lesser ninja villages, who primarily, as I mentioned earlier, dealt with matters of the supernatural.

"My home village, the Hidden Leaf is the oldest ninja village in our world, created after the two most powerful ninja clans in the world, bitter rivals who had been trying to exterminate each other for about 900 years, finally decided to have peace and make a safer world for their children. A deal was struck with the Feudal Lord at that time, in which he would grant them the land to build their village in exchange for Leaf ninja's dealing with supernatural threats and providing protection to his family. The ninja village system was meant as a means to protect children and allow them to grow up enough for them to truly experience life. Before it was established, the average age at which children of ninja died on my world was six years old, as rival clans tried their best to annihilate the offspring of their rivals. The villages that sprung up in every country after ours was created, successfully eliminated this problem for the most part, allowing children to grow up, to learn and to only take on missions they could handle. A Jounin was provided as a teacher to every Genin, creating a four-man cell. This was both to protect the young ninja and educate them. In the event that an enemy overwhelmed the Jounin, and this was something perhaps unique to our village, the Jounin would generally lay down his life to allow the Genin to escape to safety. Anyway, later on, after other nations copied our ninja village system and began collecting clans of their own, an added stipulation by the Feudal Lord was that we ninja protect the nation itself from invasion by foreign ninjas. If the Feudal Lord's regular army went up against trained ninja's, it would've been a slaughter. Even one ninja can annihilate thousands of regular samurai in seconds. The Hokage at the time in turn convince the Feudal Lord to allow the village to higher out its ninja's as – for lack of a better term – mercenaries. These ninjas would perform missions for a client that would earn money for the village as whole to sustain itself, and would in turn receive a stipend for their part in the mission. How much they were paid depended on the difficulty of the mission and the rank of ninja in question. Ranks ranged from D, C, B, A and finally S. D rank missions being things like walking a dog, painting a fence, babysitting and fetching a missing pet. C rank involved eliminating bandits, drug cartels and other such mundane trouble makers, as well as escort of civilians or important goods. The involvement of enemy ninja automatically made a mission B rank, with that rank increasing if the other ninja had a high rank. The A rank missions are where things like espionage, infiltration, assassination and intel gathering really came into play, and S rank missions generally meant near suicidal odds for the average ninja were in play, but those were also generally vital for the prosperity of the nations..." Naruto continued talking about his world, specifically none classified information. Giving everyone an idea of its nature and the way of things back home. It took a few hours of their time.

When he finally finished talking, Green Lantern just threw up his hands and said. "Your life is crazy man. I just gotta say it, and it's the honest to god truth man, and this is coming from a freaking space cop who regular travels to alien worlds"

Standing up, Batman said. "Okay, I think we are done with all the relevant stuff, except for one final matter."

"And what is that?" Superman asked.

Turning to Naruto the Dark Knight said. "Naruto Uzumaki, I acknowledge you've taken a big risk with telling us about your home world. You've bestowed a remarkable amount of trust in us, so I feel it's only appropriate I reciprocate a fraction of that trust back to you. I will not unmask in this place, too many eyes outside are watching us, but they certainly can't hear us. My real name is Bruce Wayne, I am sure if you google it you will find my home address and numerous pictures of me. Come by Wayne Manor discretely on the weekend, we have a lot to talk about."

"As you all know, I don't have a mask, but I have a secret identity that I work very hard to protect. It helps me blend in with normal people. My birth name is Kal-El and I am from the planet Krypton which was destroyed many years ago. My parents sent me to Earth before they died with the planet, so I can sympathize with how your parents gave their lives to protect you shortly after your birth. I was found by a loving couple, and grew up in Kansas as a farmboy. My adopted human name is Clark Joseph Kent; I prefer Clark."

"Victor Stone, but you already know that and my story." Cyborg said with a nod.

"Princess Diana of Themyscira, and I told you about myself when we first met." She said, reminding him of their meeting during the invasion.

With a little reluctance the Flash said. "I guess I'm next. My name is Bartholomew Henry Allen but everyone calls me Barry Allen. I'm a CSI in Central City."

"Princess Mera of the Kingdom of Xebel, one of the original Atlantis' seven city-states." Mera introduced herself officially.

Aquaman went right after her, making Mera Scowl a little, but she kept her emotions in check as he said. "To Atlantis and the dwellers of the deep, I am King Orin of Atlantis, ruler of the seven seas. To America and the nations of the surface, I am Arthur Curry, and my home is in Amnesty bay."

"Of course once you got the ball rolling Spooky, everybody started revealing their secret identities. Now I will feel like a dick if don't tell him mine. Fine. I'm Hal Jordan, ace pilot, space cop and adventurer. Coast city is my home, and this entire space-sector is my beat." Green Lantern said confidently.

"I see." Naruto replied, feeling somewhat shocked that they had all revealed their names to him. It reminded him a lot of when the same thing happened with the Tailed Beasts. Smiling he said. "Thank you for telling me your names, my friends. I didn't want to say it earlier, but calling you by your Superhero names was becoming annoying. You real names are just so much more…real."

"Superhero?" Aquaman asked.

"That's what the government is calling us, now that they want to be a team." Batman clarified, turning to everyone he added. "And with this, we've finally come to the end of our meeting. I will schedule another in the days to come, in order to discuss a name for our team, and so that we can finalize what we want from the government. However, for now there are people who need our help out there, and about a thousand reporter who I am sure will wanting to take our pictures, so you all better give them your best smile."

VvV

**Darkseid's Palace, Apokolips...**

Darkseid stood on the balcony of his palace, leading to the regenesis matrix, a device holding a diluted pool of Element X and several other divine liquids, with which he could immerse himself and accelerate the healing of his substantial wounds. He had spent three days submerged in this pool due to the severity of his injuries, and the lingering effect of the warrior called Sage's divinity suppressing abilities, from when he battled the human champions on Earth 0.

It had surprised him that they could put up such a fight, and that Sage could actually reduce his divine might to a level where the whole group could actually fight him and win. Regardless of the fact that he was never actually subdued, was definitely not killed, nor did he surrender at any point during the battle, and in the end the best the heroes were able to do was send him back to Apokolips, but Darkseid still considered this a win for the humans. The mere fact that they were able to force him to retreat, even if completely against his will, was a loss in his eyes and proof that they had won. He was a powerful and proud god, evil incarnate some might say, but he respected strength and would not spit on the accomplishments of others that he deemed worthy.

That said, he couldn't help but feel a little enraged by what Sage's clones, Superman and Batman had done to Apokolips while he fighting the rest of the Justice League on Earth. The sheer amount of damage and chaos they had caused during the brief amount of time they were on Apokolips, was simply appalling.

They successfully crippled the Apokoliptan war engine by destroying the Parademon conversion factories, freeing abducted humans meant to become Parademon reinforcements and slaughtered those that had already been converted to full Parademons. Even his subordinates, the New gods, Steppenwolf and DeSaad were not spared, with Steppenwolf being defeated in single combat and losing an arm and his treasured Electro-Axe.

The only reason either had survived being that the fact that hundreds Boomtubes all across Apokolips were forcefully opened just before Sage could deliver a finishing blow, due to the human Cyborg. This scattered the two New gods to some unknown parts of the multiverse. And as if to add insult to injury, the Cyborg promptly crashed the entire Apokoliptan Motherbox network, crippling all but a handful of Motherboxes and preventing them from opening Boomtubes to anywhere. That it stranded his military forces on Apokolips and prevented his forces from reinforcing the rest of his army already deployed to Earth-2 in his war against them, made the situation only that much more infuriating.

His people couldn't even reboot the Motherbox network because the Cyborg had infected it with a self-adapting viral codes that the network was not designed to handle. Darkseid had actually been forced to send Gordon Godfrey to locate Metron and request his aide in purging the network, as favor to him. Darkseid hated owing anyone favors, especially those like Metron who would force him to honor promises and return favors when the time came, but in this case there was no choice. If the Motherbox network was not restored to proper functionality, his brother Izaya would consider it a sign of weakness and command the forces of New Genesis to attack Apokolips. Truly as much as he respected the champions of Earth 0 for being able to force his retreat and do all this damage to Apokolips while he was distracted fighting them, Darkseid also silently swore that he would make each and every one of them pay dearly for this humiliation.

Initially Darkseid had felt nothing but rage towards those particular heroes and wanted to return right away in order to annihilate them. But after considering things carefully and with logic, he had also admitted to himself that what they had accomplished was impressive, far more so than any of their counterparts across the multiverse. Which is why he would use this defeat to forge a path towards his future victories.

Only a handful of Motherboxes with Boomtube capabilities still worked at this point, and he felt wary about using them for anything other than repairing the enormous amount of damage inflicted on Apokolips by the Justice League. However, what he planned to do had the potential to change everything, for Darkseid had not left the battlefield empty-handed.

With a gesture a tooth telekinetically floated up to his eye level, a tooth that he had knocked from the mouth of the original Sage during their battle under the ocean. The same being who had at the time shown the unique ability to drain his vast unfathomable power and grow stronger from them, weakening him to the point that the other members of the Justice League had enough of a chance that they were able to defeat him together. This being, and his ability to weaken a god, was something that truly interested Darkseid, and he intended to exploit it. He saw so much potential for someone like that under his complete control, that Darkseid couldn't help but find a way to try and manipulate Sage...or in this case, his genetic material. He wasn't quite ready to fight the brat again.

"Granny Goodness." He called, his voice rumbling like thunder throughout the room.

His loyal servant and the trainer of his elite fighting force, the female furies, quickly stepped forward from the other side of his chambers, where she had been patiently waiting for him to give her a command. The New god was the visage of an old overweight lady, was not even fazed by the fact that Darkseid was completely nude, simply dropping to a knee as she answered. "How may I do your bidding my liege?"

"I need DeSaad, find him for me. Send Kanto and whatever resources you deem necessary to retrieve him, but be discrete. I want my god-scientist found as soon as possible and brought before my feet intact. I have a special task for him, so consider this our top priority next to restoring the damage inflicted up Apokolips by those champions of Earth." He commanded.

"Of course my lord." Granny Goodness bowed her head and rose, then after a moment of hesitation asked. "Sire, If I may inquire, why do you seem so pleased?"

At first glance, Darkseid seemed as stoic and cold as ever. However, Granny Goodness had been his servant for countless millennia and thus was very family with his 'moods' and body language. Which was why she sensed that he was unusually pleased for some reason, almost happy but not quite.

"One of the humans I fought, the one that calls himself Sage. Within him lies the key to ending our stalemate with New Genesis, even without the need for the Anti-life equation. I intend to harness his power and use it to cut a swath across the entire multiverse," Darkseid replied, deigning to answer her question. "And for that, I need DeSaad back."

"Should I also instruct Kanto to find Steppenwolf?" She quickly asked the ruler of Apokolips who was still in a good mood, with trepidation in her voice.

"No. My general allowed my kingdom to fall to ruin while I was away. Let him squalor away in indignity with the humans or whatever 3rd World filth he now finds himself with. His exile in the 3rd world, along with the weight of his shame in losing his arm to a mere echo of the anti-god I fought, will serve as penance for failing all of Apokolips. As of now, Steppenwolf is forbidden from returning to Apokolips until I deem him worthy again, this is the will of **Darkseid**!" The ruler of Apokolips proclaimed, his very words carrying power in them and etching his decree into the very fabric of the Fourth World.

"Of course Sire. I will attend to my duties immediately." Granny goodness quickly said as she nervously walked away from her liege, feeling very shaken by Darkseid's words. Never once did she notice the slight twitch of amusement on Darkseid's lips.

VvV

**Metropolis Memorial garden, Outskirts of Metropolis city...**

Naruto knelt before a giant twenty-foot-tall statue made from pure diamond, and shaped like a phoenix, rising in flight. Superman had pulled it from somewhere deep in the planets core and helped chip it into its current shape. He had just finished covering it in every single security seal he knew how to perform in order to prevent anyone from stealing it or damaging it. Madame Xanadu and several of her fellow magic practitioners and friends, had also shown up earlier and added their own protective spells to it for extra security. Wonder Woman had even negotiated with Apollo for a tongue of his divine flames, which she had imbued into the center of the diamond statue, where it danced eternally, giving the whole statue a life-likeness.

According to Diana, Apollo had promised that so long as the sun continued to exist, the fire in that statue would never go out. The flames also had the unexpected side effect of giving the statue a supernatural durability approaching the levels of dwarf star matter. No diamond thieves would be cutting it up for a quick profit, especially with all the additional security to the thing in the form of seals and magical curses. Whatever Wonder Woman had said to Apollo in order to convince the god to go along with something like this was truly beyond him, but Naruto was grateful to both Diana and Apollo.

The Phoenix statue was at the center of the cleared grounds that were a quarter mile in circumference. There were twelve main pathways that spread out in equidistant directions from the center, as if marking the numbers on a clock. Additional six pathways then intersected those twelve paths at various points, in six ever expanding concentric rings, like ripples in water. Everywhere along the pathways, on either side of them lay giant stone tablet-like monoliths, with names carved into them of all those who had died in what the media was now calling the Apokolips War. Certain details about Apokolips having been released to the media by the US government after Batman handed over some of the information they had gathered, which was only what the League as a whole had agreed to hand over.

The world needed an enemy to blame and Apokolips – which was in fact responsible for the mass loss of life – was the perfect target. However, details such as information about Darkseid and other New gods, as well as that Apokolips wasn't just another planet, but rather a planet that existed beyond space, time and the entire multiverse, were kept classified. Furthermore, just last week the Justice League as his team had come to be called thanks to a writer they had saved named David Graves, were all honored at the Capitol building in Washington D.C., where they were presented with both the Presidential Medal of Freedom and the Congressional Gold Medal for saving the world, and more specifically America

Naruto had even worn a black 3 piece Armani suit for the event, since he did not actually have a costume like the others. Though the only reason he actually did it was because Madame Xanadu wanted to wear a fancy green evening dress and be seen by the photographers with him, so that they could take their picture. All the best photographers in the world where present at the event anyway, so she decided beforehand that she was going to take advantage of that.

Putting his hands together and closing his eyes, Naruto said a quick traditional prayer for the dead to rest in peace, from his homeland. It was more out of habit than anything, having done so countless times during the 4th Shinobi World War for victims of Madara Uchiha. In this foreign universe, he wasn't even sure if any of his local universe gods existed here, or whether they would even listen to his prayers of all people if they did, seeing as he was technically a godkiller. Nevertheless, it just felt right to him to say a prayer for the dead.

Naruto sighed as he rose back to his feet from where he was kneeling. With the finishing touches complete, the Metropolis Memorial garden was now open for the public. This one held the names of every single person who died or went missing during the Invasion, while still in America, regardless of nationality. Cyborg with some forensics aid from the Flash, had spent a few days cataloging a list of all the casualties which Superman used his heat vision to etch them into every stone tablet present in the memorial garden. Naruto did the same using lightning chakra, streamed into his fingertips.

There were other memorial gardens around the world that the Justice League had built to honor the dead, each of them tailored to suit the dominant culture and belief system of whatever country they were erected in. However, they were all far smaller than the one in Metropolis, and none possessed anything like the diamond phoenix statue at its center. At the statue's base, there was no elaborate wall of words or plaque. Only the words, **'They will not be forgotten'** etched with seals and magical light into the solid diamond. It was simple, but it served its purpose.

Everyone would know that these memorial gardens where there to honor the fallen during the Apokolips war. What almost no one except the other members of the Justice League would know, is that it was Naruto's idea to create the memorial gardens in order to honor the fallen, and that he had practically threatened his team with endless pranks and in some cases bribes, to get them to go along with it.

VvV

**Project Cadmus, unknown location...**

"What do you have for me Dr. Isaac?" Asked billionaire tycoon, brilliant scientist and now Director of Project Cadmus, Dr. Alexander "Lex" Luthor to one of his top employees. Already anticipating the question, Dr. Simon Isaac produced a tablet with a full report of his activities on it for Lex as he entered the facilities operations control room.

President Anderson had tasked Lex with the job of running Project Cadmus, a secret off the books division of the U.S government whose sole purpose was to provide solutions for the United States to defend itself against all enemies – mundane, supernatural, terrestrial and extraterrestrial – by any means available to them. Cadmus was designed to have no physical ties to the government that could be traced, and only the current President, as well as the Presidents to come would ever know of its existence. However, it would be the last line of defense in the event of another invasion or the unlikely scenario in which the Justice League went rogue

As Lex scrolled through the information on the tablet, Dr. Isaac said. "Welcome Director Luther. For today, we were able to discretely acquire seven new Metahuman specimens, and of those seven, there are two who will be of particular interest to you. Elisha and Lara Falls, a brother and sister duo with particularly interesting abilities."

Lex liked Dr. Isaac for his professionalism and his straight to the point attitude. He was good at getting things done, intelligent and a hard worker, qualities Lex respected in a man. "Which are?" He asked.

"They individually have the ability to control space and time. Elisha seems to be able to generate fields of hyper-accelerated, hyper-slowed and stagnant time, at varying distances around himself. One of the guards who brought him food earlier today, had the unfortunate luck to run into a hyper-accelerated chrono-field that Elisha subconsciously projected, and was promptly turned into fine dust moments later. He visibly aged thousands of years in a mere 3.4 seconds flat, until even his bones broke down to their base elements. Strangely, his scream of agony lasted 5 seconds longer, after the complete deterioration of his body, something to look into I think." Dr. Isaac said, sounding both saddened and excited by what had happened.

"I see, well done." He congratulated the man who simply nodded. "Mercy." Lex said turning to his ever present shadow, secretary and bodyguard, Mercy Graves.

She stepped forward to his side and replied. "Yes sir?" Pulling out a tablet of her own, already anticipating what Lex wanted much to his approval.

"Make sure that the family of the guard who died, gets his retirement package, a big extra bonus large enough to sustain them for the rest of their natural life, a letter of condolences from yours truly and a bouquet of flowers." Lex listed off to her.

Mercy nodded once as she replied. "Yes sir." Then began making the arrangements on her tablet as she added. "It will be done shortly."

"Good girl." Lex said with charming smile.

Dr. Isaac's curiosity was clearly visible to anyone looking at him, as he observed the interplay between the two, before finally saying to his boss. "That's quite generous of you, sir."

"Generous? Not at all Simon." Lex scoffed at the very idea. "I just like to reward hard work and good results, and let's face it, the guard who died helped provide unique insight into the abilities of our latest specimen, which will be a real game changer in achieving Project Cadmus's primary goal. Also think of the sheer possibilities and of what we can learn about time itself by merely studying this boy."

"In that case you will just love his sister." Dr. Isaac said with a small smile, as he swiped his hand repeated across his tablet with practiced ease to access the relevant data.

"Oh, tell me about this Lara Falls? You mentioned that they control space and time, and since Elisha manipulates time, then Lara must manipulate space." Lex said with a grin.

"Yes sir. Lara Falls' ability seems to distort space around her so that nothing can actually touch her, unless she allows it. The sole exception to this rule being her brother, and even then we suspect she subconsciously allows him to touch her. She can increase or shorten the distance between herself and everything else in the world, at will, and to extreme distances it seems. Just bringing her to this facility actually required digging up the ground she was lying on from beneath her and transporting it with her on top in order to physically move her. Any attempt to touch her by anyone but Elisha, has resulted in failure. She increases the distance between herself and whoever or whatever is trying to touch her until what should've been a single step or maybe two, suddenly became 600 miles." Dr. Isaac explained, and at Lex's skeptical look he added. "We fired a rocket boosted mini-drone with an advanced sensor suite at her, it's been flying at her for the last 3 hours without success." Dr. Isaac shrugged.

Grabbing his clearly shaven chin, Lex rubbed it as he said. "Fascinating. In your personal assessment, do you believe these abilities can be trained?" Lex Luthor fully believed that they could, but he wanted to hear the opinions of his subordinates. It helped him with rooting out the innovators and creative minds that would push Project Cadmus and Lexcorp forward, from the parasites and dullards that would hold it back.

"Yes." Dr. Isaac replied without hesitation. "They are just kids, scared kids who recently lost their parents in the Apokolips War, but I fully believe subjects Aeon and Spatial can be trained and taught to harness their incredible abilities under Project Cadmus's supervision. So far I have identified that Elisha subconsciously applies hyper-accelerated chrono-fields to his hands, aging whatever he touches, yet after three days without food he instinctively deactivated the fields long enough to eat a meal, keeping it from rotting and turning to dust. He also instinctively applies a stagnation field over his clothes, which as far as I can tell are time-locked and cannot be harmed by anything. Additionally, according to Elisha, his big sister Lara had to bring down some kind of barrier that surrounded her for him to physically touch her. Its subconscious so far, but proof that they can on some level control their abilities."

"Good work. These two will do just nicely. Fast track them to division Kr, I will be handling them personally." Lex said with a sinister grin.

Gulping audibly, Dr. Isaac responded "Of course Director."

"Tell me something Simon. Were their powers activated by Sage, like all the others we have acquired?" Lex asked.

"Yes, they were. He was too late to save their families, and they were on the brink of being taken by Parademons when he teleported them to safety, inadvertently activating their unique powers. He was careless, just like with the others." Dr. Isaac confirmed.

"That fool is the gift that just keeps on giving." Lex said with chuckle to himself. "You've done well Isaac, but we need more. We need an army in order to be ready for the day that the Justice League reveals their true colors, instead of this pretense of being benevolent gods. I find anybody who would willingly team up with that monster from Krypton, suspicious, especially when they appear from out of thin air. My plants in the government tell me that a false identity was created for Sage recently, but they were unable to gain access to his civilian identity before Cyborg locked them out."

"And you are sure that Cyborg can't get in here somehow." Dr. Isaac asked warily, at the mention of the mechanical god safeguarding all the Justice League's secrets and keeping an eye on the digital world for any sign of a threat.

Snorting Lex replied. "There is a reason for all the extreme security measures in place, around this facility. Security measures that I designed myself, I might add. Nothing from outside with a computer chip is allowed to approach this place, and likewise, nothing with a chip from inside is allowed to leave. Additionally, we are miles underground and the secret entrance is at a Lexcorp facility in a different city where you are required hand in your cellphone and every chipped device that Cyborg might be able to track. That entrance is heavily guarded and there are no digital records taken. The guards themselves were selected because they have eidetic memories, good observation skills and are utterly loyal to me. There is also a small analogue micro-nuke that can be easily be activated by any one of the guards in the event that some intruder comes across the entrance, to bury it and all evidence.

"Furthermore, this facility is shield by a massive Faraday cage that is always active, then above us is a massive natural deposit of lead to shield us from the Superman's X-ray vision. The hills on the surface emit fluctuating Electromagnetic fields that interfere with all radio waves and most of the EM spectrum, rendering satellite surveillance and any other form of scanning you can care to mention useless, also making this area a naturally occurring communication deadzone. Core staff like yourself live here 24/7, constantly guarded by a private army I bought several years ago composed of mercenaries whose identities I erased. We have some of the best chefs in the world on our payroll and you don't even need the internet for anything down here, because I downloaded the entire internet minus all but a mere 5 percent of the porn on it to a local database of my own design in order to keep you all entertained. We grow our own food, produce our own power, and create our own technology, which we then discretely leak the old prototypes to U.S government through Lexcorp in order to keep them the dominant military power in the world. Me and Mercy are really the only people who come and go frequently from this facility, and I have ways to make sure no one is tracking us. If the world above us died for any reason, then everyone down here would survive as a colony to repopulate. This facility is even equipped with the terraforming technology necessary to fix the planet, if it was suddenly rendered lifeless for some reason, and all that doesn't even begin to scratch the surface of all the security measures in place." Lex finished.

"I see your point." Dr. Isaac had seen the list of defensive and precautionary measures that Lex had set up to keep Cadmus hidden from the world and more importantly, the Justice League. It was impressive to say the least, and extreme in many cases, even by his loose standards. However, he also trusted Lex Luthor to know what he was doing, considering the man regularly picked fights with Superman of all people and walked away unscathed.

"Still, there is nothing wrong with over-engineering, I'll say. We could always make more improvements to my designs." Lex said with a shrug before walking off as he threw back over his shoulder. "But that can come later, for now I want to see this Aeon and Spatial for myself."

VvV

**A bar, somewhere outside Silver city, New Mexico...**

"Another." A 'uniquely' beautiful woman said with a happy smile, lightly thumping her empty beer mug for the bartender to refill it with hard whiskey. She had pale, grayish skin, long luscious black hair, a figure that would put supermodels to shame and red eyes that glowed in low light. Yet despite her clearly inhuman feature, dressed in black form fitting jeans, cowboy boots, a navy blue tank top, a feminine black leather western jacket and navy blue Stetson, she looked absolutely stunning to the locals.

So much so that several members of a biker gang that frequented that particular bar, were eyeing her up and down and had been doing so since she entered the joint hours ago and began her drinking spree. Eventually, fed up of waiting for her to show signs of actually getting drunk, one of the bikers, a big bear of a man with a thick beard, bald head and muscular tattoo filled arms walked up to the strange woman and said. "Hey baby, why don't you come along with me, and good old Harry will show you good time."

Grail, for that was this woman's name simply rose an index finger in the air, in the universal sign of "wait of a moment", even as she guzzled down half a liter of whiskey from her refilled mug in one go, without even so much as flinching. Harry who looked shocked for a moment, looked back at his friends who gave him a thumbs up in encouragement before he looked back at the woman, particularly at her ass. Between her tight jeans and the bar stool she was seated on, doing absolute wonders for it, Harry couldn't help himself, he took a swing at the woman's ass...or at least tried to.

Grail merely switched her beer mug from her right hand to her left hand in the blink of an eye, and without even pausing as she continued to drink, meanwhile her right hand came down to casually block Harry's attempt to swat her ass. Smacking his arm aside as if it was nothing, which to her it was, she retaliated by chopping him in the throat which cut off his air supply. Harry was still reaching up to grab his throat in pain and shock as he struggled to breathe, only for Grail to form a fist, which she used to back-fist him in the balls...lightly, for her. Harry's eyes widened in agony as a scream failed to tear itself from his collapsed throat, manifesting instead as some kind of strangled choke.

He doubled over clutching at his balls, while Grail grabbed the back of his head and helped him along, slamming his face into the bar counter, knocking him out cold. Harry was unconscious before he even hit the floor, while Grail tipped the last of her whiskey down her throat before slamming her cup on the counter and demanding. "Another." The whole thing had happened in under two seconds flat.

The bartender looked at her in shock, then looked at poor Harry who was unconscious on the floor with a nasty gash on his head, and then at his dozen or so friends in the back who were still trying to process what the hell had just happened, before he said. "Look lady I don't want trouble, and you've brought trouble into my bar." He finished with a nod to the biker gang who still hadn't moved from where they were standing, but where now clearly beginning to react and grow angry, as some of them were clutching at their belts where they had concealed weapons.

Grail looked behind her, and raised an eyebrow in amusement, then dismissively looked back the Bartender as she said. "Get me your strongest liquor." She then pulled out a solid 24 karat gold bar and dropped it on the bar counter.

"That's-" He began in shock, but was cut off.

"Payment for the drinks I've already drunk, the one you are about to give me and any damages incurred in the next five minutes. I think that bottle of Everclear Firewhiskey will do." She said, before leaning forward and whispering. "It would be a shame if you had to shut down your establishment because of me."

With a wink, Grail reached past the bartender and grabbed the bottle in question before the bartender could protest, and then turned around to face the biker gang who had gotten over their shock and surrounded her while she wasn't looking. Popping the liquor bottle open and taking a large gulp, she waited to see what the mortals would try against her. One of the braver biker gang members walked up to her and said. "Hey missus, I know Harry can be an asshole but he didn't deserve watcha did ta him."

Still blatantly guzzling down alcohol, Grail looked back at Harry's unconscious body who was bleeding quite a lot from the gash on his forehead, and then back to the man who had spoken. Bringing down the bottle she had been drinking from this whole time, Grail merely shrugged and said. "I don't like being touched by strangers, and if you know what's good for you, you will drag your friend away, take him to a hospital and act like this never happened. I'm in a particularly good mood today boys, my tyrant of father just got his teeth kicked in by a rather cute blonde boy. I wouldn't advise any of you trying to ruin that mood, for your own sakes, that is."

"I don't know what yer talking about ya crazy bitch, but Harry's our friend, ain't nobody gets ta treat him this way." Another brave member of the gang said pulling out Bowie hunting knife threateningly as he stepped towards her, while the rest followed, closing in on her.

Grail ignored them like the insects they were, nothing they had could even hurt her and luckily for them she didn't feel like killing anybody today. Instead of worry, Grail took one last long draw from the bottle of Everclear, nearly emptying it, before belching loudly and saying. "Oh Hades, this one wasn't bad. I almost felt buzzed this time." With that her red eyes took on a brighter glow and her smile turned from beatific to sinister, as she finally gave the gang her full attention.

Before any of the men could even react to her, she swiped her hand around her, splashing the liquor into the eyes of the men surrounding her. Screams erupted from everyone who got even the tiniest amount of Everclear in their eyes, while a few managed to cover themselves protectively.

Grail shot forward in a blur and shoulder checked the nearest of the unaffected bikers, sending him tumbling through a table and into the wooden wall on the far side of the room. Dodging a punch from another biker, Grail lightly thumped him in the shoulder, dislocated it, before pulling him into haymaker thrown by another man, knocking the one with a dislocated shoulder out. With a soft and casual kick to her last attacker's balls, in order to not utterly destroy his pelvis, the man doubled over in agony where Grail put him out of his misery with a gentle elbowed to the side of his head, allowing for him to collapsed bonelessly to the floor.

She had taken her sweet time with this, whatever it was...fight was not the term that came to mind, nor was any other word that implied that this was in anyway a conflict. Grail had shown incredible restraint against the mortals, and none of them would ever know how close they were to death that day. If she had wanted to, she could've physically ripped out the hearts of every single person in the bar before anyone could even blink

By then everyone in the bar who was not involved in this altercation had already fled outside, and everyone who was involved, was either blind and screaming in pain, knocked unconscious or the bartender, who was busy dialing 911 behind the bar-counter. Grail looked at the bartender in amusement before shaking her head, human mortals were as pathetic as ever. She quickly riffled through each and every one of the Biker's pockets for keys to their rides outside, knocking out anyone who resisted with a finger flick.

Ten minutes later, Grail was cruising down the interstate high way in a black and red custom Harley-Davidson V-Rod at top speed. Her Stenson was blown clean off her head, allowing her hair to whip around in the wind freely, as she cruised away at 200 miles an hour. Grail hadn't had this much fun in over a 1000 years, and she was determined to thank the man who had made this all possible, as well find out everything she could about the Justice League of this universe, particularly about the one called Sage. He now had her attention and only fates knew if that was a blessing or a curse.

TBC...

* * *

Okay, so I hope you enjoyed the chapter. Sorry for all the talking, honestly I prefer writing action scenes, but I have been watching the entirety of Naruto Shippuden to get a bit of a feel for Naruto and then extrapolating from that how I believe a longer war would've changed him. Movies and anime are fun right up until you actually begin studying them to write a more accurate story, then they begin to suck. Anyway, next chapter will continue to wrap up a few loose ends, as well set up a few new things including the beginning of the next arc, not sure who will be the main antagonist though, I got a few people in mind. I will also hopefully show a bit about Naruto's settling into his life as a Superhero.

As for me, like I said earlier, I am back. I don't currently have a job (Thanks to this damn virus), my university closed down, and I am stuck very far away from home. Also the internet prices, tripled for some reason, still I will try and get things out as fast as possible now that I got some time on my hands.

Also, I created a page last year, mostly to prevented some guy who was plagiarizing my work and posting it on other sites, pretending to be me and asking people for money, from opening up a account with my user name, ScarletAeisir058(I am very attached to it). Anyway, check me out on p a treon (slash) ScarletAesir058, if you feel you are willing to help support me, right now more than ever I could really use your help, (because I am in a foreign country and all the borders are close) but I will do my best deliver content to you regardless. However, it's not something critical, I am safe and have a roof over my head so only donate what you feel comfortable giving. It will also really help me expand into writing crossovers with other franchises, because a big chunk of my time writing each chapter is used up researching stuff online in order to make everything seem as realistic as possible. Anyway, thank you once again for your time and support. And please please please, leave a review. They really help me as a writer, to improve my skills and get a feel for what you my audience like.

Till next time, Scarlet Out!


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